The Forever Moments
by angel-death-dealer
Summary: Ian's out of jail and wants revenge. He holds Abigail hostage to get Ben and Riley to lead him to the location of Isis's necklace, which holds the power to change the world, or destroy it. Can they get Abigail back and destroy the necklace before its too
1. Escape

**This is the start of my longer National Treasure fic! Finally getting around to it! This is for Toxic-Beetle, the devil on my shoulder forcing me to continue writing, and before I start, I need to thank her for all that she's done to help me with this story, considering that I never would have started it if it hadn't been for her. So this is for Toxic-Beetle, and out ever crazy talks about Vanessa Paradis and the poisoned spag bol.**

**I don't own anyone except Abigail's brother at the moment, everything else belongs to the professionals. If I did own the others, I would be doing something a lot more interesting right now that tidying my bedroom while posting this up.**

**Anyhow, on with the first chapter!**

**Sam**

**xx**

**Chapter 1: Step Forward In Time**

_"Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be shelter for the other. Now you will feel no cold, for each of you will be warmth to the other. Now there will be no loneliness, for each of you will be companion to the other. Now you are two persons, but there is only one life for you. May beauty surround you both in the journey ahead and through all the years. May happiness be your companion and your days together be good and long upon the earth._

_Treat yourselves and each other with respect, and remind yourselves often of what brought you together. Give the highest priority to the tenderness, gentleness and kindness that your connection deserves. When frustration, difficulty and fear assail your relationship - as they threaten all relationships at one time or another - remember to focus on what is right between you, not only the part which seems wrong. In this way, you can ride out storms when clouds hide the face of the sun from your lives - remembering that even if you lose sight of it for a moment, the sun is still there. And if each of you takes responsibility for the quality of your life together, it will be marked by abundance and delight."_

Remembering their wedding was one of Abigail's favourite things to do. The day had been wonderful, perfect, and nothing had spoilt it. She had never thought that it would have been so easy to smile all day, even through the tears she had shed when Riley had recited his best man's speech, using the Blessing of the Apaches (A/N: Above). Of course, Ben didn't have as much family attending as she did, and for once it was good to see all her family together getting along and not arguing over the tiniest things. One of the highlights of the day was seeing her older brother, Michael, chatting casually with Ben, rather than threatening to break his legs if he hurt her. Everything was wonderful, she couldn't have asked for a better day. There were no problems, no fears, only happiness and love.

And that happiness and love was still there, two years on from their wedding. Riley lived with Abigail and Ben in the large country manor that was easily big enough for the three of them, if not more, and they had lived normally since their adventures with the treasure of the Founding Fathers. Abigail still worked at the National Archives, yet she felt more pressure with her job considering that it had been proven that the Decleration of Independance could be stolen, so she was always under constant watch when she was around the Decleration. Ben and Riley taught American History at the nearest Washington University, and often visited various parts of America to give lectures to other universities regarding the treasure.

One morning, everyone was up earlier than usual, giving the three time to sit down and relax before heading off to work. Abigail sat opposite Ben at the wooden table that stood in the centre of the kitchen, and Riley sat between them, reading the paper. Abigail had her usual mug of coffee, claiming that she would kill someone if she didn't have coffee in the morning, Ben was drinking tea, and at that time of morning, Riley would drink whatever they put in front him. It was too early for Riley to have much of an attention span at 7.30. So the couple were wondering whether he was really reading the paper or simply trying to form the words out.

Today, Abigail had let her hair hang loose, rather than pulling it back. She always prefered having her hair loose, although when she was having to bend over to look at documents all day, it was useful to have it pulled out of her eyes. Today though, she knew that there was no chance of having to examine anything close up, as it was all paperwork that she had put off from the previous day. They heard a soft moan coming from behind the newspaper, and Abigail looked up at Ben with a confused frown and a suspcious look was cast at Riley.

"Riley?" Ben asked with a soft laugh, pulling back the newspaper and finding Riley fast asleep in his chair. Abigail laughed. Ben was about to shake him.

"No!" Abigail said in a whisper, getting up from her chair to fill a glass of water.

"Abi, that's just mean." Ben commented.

"Well then, we're even now aren't we." She said with a devilish smile. Last week, Abigail had had a long day at work and was exhausted; she had just settled down on the sofa with Ben, and was starting to drift off into sleep, when a familiar trickle of water had dripped down her cheek, and she had opened her eyes to find Riley poised over her and a now asleep Ben with a glass of water.

She held the glass over his head, and let a few drops fall onto his forehead. "Abigail. I am going to kill you if you do that again." Riley commented groggily with his eyes still closed. She hid the lass of water over on the workstop, and flashed him an innocent smile which caused Ben to laugh.

"I don't know what you mean, Riley." She said sarcastically. "We must have a leak."

Riley opened his eyes, and reclaimed his newspaper. "Yeah, in your head."

"Now we're even." She reminded him.

Riley mumbled something that neither of them could understand and picked up his tea, drinking more or less the whole cup before setting it back down on the table. "Ouch, that was hot." He said, shaking his head. "I burnt my tongue."

"Boiling water normally is hot." Ben pointed out.

In the background, the radio started playing a song that Abigail knew and she sang along with it while tracing the rim of her cup. "Please don't tell me you like this song." Riley laughed.

Abigail looked up with a look on her face that resembled a child being told Santa wasn't real. "I love this song."

Riley laughed again and Abigail carried on singing in spite of him. Ben sighed. It was like living with two teenagers sometimes with their friendly bickering, but it was all good entertainment for him.

The song finished halfway through, though, and was interrupted by an news reader. "This news just in. Last night, after a riot at Washington State Prison, three prisoners are currently on the loose. David Burrows, Jack Pescucci and Ian Howe-" Ben gagged on his tea, and Abigail's hand dropped loudly against the table. "-are all suspected to be in the area still. Further information will be given when we have it, but for now, do not allow any suspicious individuals near your home, and under no circumstances are you to approach these men. If you know any information call this number..."

Abigail stopped listening when she had heard Ian's name. She thought it was over. She thought they would never have anything to do with him again. Her eyes met Ben's, and he gave her that look he always gave her when she looked worried, only this time, it didn't make her feel better, because she could see the confusion and worry in his eyes as well.

"Well," Riley began, "That's not good."

**Hope you all liked this first chappie. Will post up the next one once I have 4 reviews.**

**Sam  
xx**


	2. When You're Gone

**God, I guess I should update seeing as I have had 9 reviews for the first chapter. OMG that more than ever, I can't even begin to say how happy that made me. Now, though, I'm being careful with what I write in case it's not up to the same standard. Woah. So thank you to my wonderful reviewers!**

**Mir: I'm glad you liked it :D Here's your update.**

**Sarahofearth: Great to hear you liked Riley's moment, I'm working a lot of them into this. **

**SamuriKnight: Another chapter! I didn't even think that it would be popular like it is.**

**Meredith A. Jones: A major apology to you. I've changed the summary, but not to worry, because the storyline is not stolen or copied from yours at all. I would explain how but I don't want to give away the plot, so I am very very sorry for that.  
****  
Jedi Mase: Decently written? Thank you for that compliment, I can't say that anyone has actually said I've written something decently before, thank you.  
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Hollysgirl: Thanks, I'm glad you like it. :D**

**Toxic-Beetle: What can I say? I had to update, I don't want any more poisoned spag bol, and I don't want to feel your wrath lol, so here you go! Of course he's stating the obvious hehe, thats what he's there for. **

**Lee Tea: Im glad that I've kept everyone in character. The main person I'm worried about keeping in character is Abigail, as she's not really a character I'm used to writing. The glass of water was inspired by something that happened not too long ago with me and my brother.**

**Kirarocks92677: Im glad you like the first chapter, I've finally got around to reviewing, its been a bit heptic with all my revision, but its finally getting done :D**

**The next few weeks might have slow updates, considering I have my exams now, and should be revising, even though there is no hope for anything except English and Media Studies, maybe German if I push it, but I hate it anyway. So until the middle of June, my updates are going to be limited, maybe to one over the whole lot. So please bear in mind that if I am not updating enough, it is because of that, and I will make up for it after they are finished.**

**So without further ado, here's the second chapter :D**

**Sam**

**xx**

**The Forever Moments**

**Chapter 2: Worse News**

Abigail closed the car door with more of a slam than usual. Riley got into the back, and Ben into the driver seat. Riley sat in silent awe, wondering how she could slam a door over and over again, but not open an unopened jar. Apparently that required a different set of muscles. They were silent for about ten minutes, before Abigail broke the silence that clung to them so tightly, it was choking them. "I suppose they couldn't keep someone like Ian in there forever." She said as if it were something obvious, but she didn't believe it. She didn't want to believe it. She wanted to be able to think that Ian would never come near them again.

Riley stayed quiet, as did Ben. But after a few minutes, Abigail ran her hands over her face and through her hair; an action that they both knew as one of distress, and Ben took his hand off the gears to put it on her knee. "Don't worry, Abigail." He said, the car was so quiet, and there was no other traffic around them, so they didn't need to raise their voices above a whisper. "He won't do anything."

"How do you know that?" She asked quietly. Her voice was louder than his, but still quiet. "You sent him to prison, Ben. Do you think he's broken out and going to leave you alone?"

Of course not, Ben realised. "He won't go anywhere near you." He promised. "You're completely safe from him. I won't let anything happen to you." She looked at him, and Riley could see the gentle fear in her face fade as their eyes locked momentarily. He sometimes wondered if he would ever fall in love like they had, but at the moment, he was quiet content with his car, his computer, and his food. He definately admired the effect they had on each other though, considering that whenever they weren't with each other, they were talking about each other, and when they were together, they wouldn't leave each other alone. They had been married for two years, but they were still acting as though it were the first two weeks. Riley had never guessed that public displays of affection (or 'infection' as Riley called it) would have gone down so well with Ben.

Ben turned back to the road with a heavy heart. He wasn't as worried as the others were about Ian, but he didn't like the idea of either his wife or his best friend being hurt. Just thinking about it made him shudder. To make matters worse, he couldn't deny that Ian was capable of hurting them, considering he had held a gun to them and planned to shoot them if they didn't tell him where the treasure was, and he was going to leave them to rot if they hadn't escaped the catacombs, something he remembered all to well that didn't go down smoothly with Riley. All he could do now, was to hope that he would stay away, and if he didn't make sure that he was kept away from them all by whatever proved necessary.

They were silent for the rest of the journey, until they got to the National Archives, where Abigail leaned over the car and kissed Ben quickly before getting out of the car.

"Do you want a lift back?" Ben asked her, before she closed the door. "Or are you picking up the Aston?"

As tempting as it sounded to pick up the Aston Martin at lunch, she shook her head, "No, I probably won't get a chance to get it today." She said regretfully.

"I'll come down then." Ben told her.

She closed the door, and Riley climbed through the car and put himself into the passanger seat rather awkwardly. Ben gave him a strange look for doing this, but he didn't care. He was getting those looks from Ben a lot recently, but it made no difference to what he did, after all, being slightly strange was almost a trademark to him. "She'll be OK." Riley told him, seeing the look that was still plastered on his friends face as he watched Abigail disappear into the building.

"I know." Ben agreed, starting up the engine and driving away.

Abigail sat down at her desk with a heavy sigh. For a while, she just sat there, ignoring the paperwork on her desk and let the answerphone pick up several phone messages she was in no mood to take. Just when everything was going brilliantly, Ian had to spoil it. Again. She had just got herself into every one's good books at work, when Ian (well, maybe that was partly Ben's fault also) had resulted in her nearly loosing her job because of the Decleration being stolen (ok, maybe that was mostly Ben's fault). Just when they had almost found the treasure location, Ian had to show up with his men and spoil it, stealing the Decleration from where it was safe, with them. And worst of all, just when she and Ben had kissed and things were beginning to look up, Ian's daring to get to the treasure immediately had nearly resulted in the Decleration, as well as her and Ben, falling God knows how far down to their obvious death. It was only after they had been threatened and left for head, that he had done something useful to them: leaving them alone. And now they had a wonderful house, a wonderful life, and Ian had broken out with the possibility of spoiling it for them all.

The door to her office opened, and her assistant, Christine, came in with a tray. Upon it was a cup of coffee, and a small pile of papers. She smiled at the coffee, but didn't give a second glance to the work beside it. Christine was one of Abigail's closest friends, which was useful as they worked together as well. She had dark chestnut hair and stunning blue eyes. "Ok." She said like a mother would to a child, which, being older than Abigail, she sometimes seemed to like doing too much. "I saw the news, and from the look of it, so did you." She gave Abigail the mug of coffee, watching as the blonde woman accepted the cup and took a deep sip from it. "Looks like you need this."

Abigail set the cup down, and seeing as she didn't have any work she intended on doing at that moment, Christine sat down opposite her. "Thank you." She said with a soft smile; the presence of her friend making her feel better already.

"No need to thank me Abigail, it's just a cup of coffee." Christine smiled.

"It's just made my day bearable." Abigail told her.

Christine was about to answer when the phone rang. This time, Abigail answered it. "Abigail Chase." She answered. She still used her maiden name for work, as it was too much hassle to let everyone know she had changed it, but it felt strange, having answered to that name for so many years, and now she hated using it.

"Abs?"

The voice was shaken, but there was no mistaking it. Only one person called her Abs, and that was one of her older brothers, Michael. She hadn't heard from him for months, as he was travelling in Africa, and the sound of his voice brought an instant smile to her.

"Michael? It's so great to hear from you!"

He didn't return her happiness though. "Are you busy?"

She looked over the pile of paperwork before her. "No, I'm not busy."

"Good." He replied. "I need to see you."

"Sure, come down." She told him, worrying a little. "What is it?"

"I can't tell you over the phone." He told her. "I'll be there in a while."

With that he hung up. That _definately _wasn't like him. Michael was always the brother who protected her, who looked after her, as there was only a year between them. He had always been happy and optimistic, and yet on the phone she could have easily mistaken him for her other brother, Marcus, who more serious. Something had him worried, that he couldn't talk about on the phone. _God knows what trouble he's in now, _Abigail thought, _if he thinks I'm giving him a place to hide he can think again. He might be my brother, but I'm not hiding him from another gang. _Remembering what happened last time he had turned to her for help when he was being 'hunted' by some rather nasty characters, she had her flat trashed, so there was no way she was letting herself in for that again.

"Bad news?" Christine asked her. Abigail frowned and shook her head.

"No idea. Michael said he needs to talk to me about something. He sounded, worried, upset even."

It was an hour later that Michael arrived. Christine made herself scarce, leaving the brother and sister to talk. As soon as he walked in the door, Abigail left her desk to hug him. However, when she put her arms around him, he held her tighter than usual, "Michael?" She asked pulling away, looking up at him. "What's wrong?"

His had darker hair than her, like her father's, but their mother's blue eyes that were the same ocean colour as hers. Unlike Marcus, who was brown haired and brown eyes like their uncles. His eyes today were filled with sadness, and it scared her a little, as she had never seen anything make him act so strangely.

"Sit down, Abs." He told her gently. She went over to the couch on the side of her office and he followed her. She sat on the edge of it, facing towards him, and he knelt down infront of her.

"Michael, what's going on?" She asked him again.

Looking at her, he started speaking, but the first four words already told her what had happened. "Abigail, there's been an accident..." Michael began. He looked away, but she could see the tears welling up in his eyes. "We need to go to California." She shook her head.

"This can't be happening."

"Mom and Dad-"

"They're going to be OK aren't they?"Perhaps the silence that hung in the air after her question was worse than an answer. Still, Michael looked into the corner of her office, unable to meet her eyes. "Aren't they Michael?"

He shook his head, and tears sprang to her eyes. She brought her hand over her mouth and shook her head again. _Please, no. This can't be happening. _Michael's voice threatened to break into sobs as he told her, but he forced himself to hold out as he told Abigail what had happened. "They were driving down the freeway on Friday night." He began, finally meet her eyes, where he could see the tears down her face. "A truck swerved off course, went into their lane...hit them head on..." Abigail leaned forward, resting her elbows on her forearms and letting herself cry properly. "They said they didn't stand a chance."

"So, they're-" She couldn't bring herself to say it.

"They're dead, Abigail." Michael confirmed. "Mom and Dad are dead."

**Ok, people might hate me for this. I hate to kill people off, but its the only way I can bring in another character. I hope I've managed to keep them in character though.**

**Sam**

**xxx**


	3. Are We The Waiting?

Suddenly, Abigail felt like she was five years old again. Sitting in her brother's car, staring at her hands as if it might be some help to her. All this time, her parents had been there for her, they had encouraged her through every step of her education so she could work in her dream job at the Archives. It was only through them moving the family to America to give them a better chance that any of them had got this far in life. But now, now they were gone. Just like that, they were orphans.

"Oh god." She muttered, feeling selfish that she hadn't realised it before. She had been too wound up in her own greif that she had completely forgotten one person who was no doubt more confused than anyone else. "Ryan."

Ryan Chase was Abigail and Michael's younger brother. He had only just turned five years old, the youngest of the Chase children. He was the only one of them that lived with their parents now, what had happened to him?

"He's staying with Elsa until us and Marcus get there." Michael told her.

Elsa was their aunt who happened to live two doors down from their parents. She was a nice aunt, but had a terrible habit of putting her foot in it at bad situations. She was always there for them when they were growing up. Abigail nodded. "What's going to happen to him?" She asked. Ryan was so close to her, and she to him, that she had always regretted it when her parents had moved with him to California from their home in Washington last year. She had sworn that while her brothers teased him like any brother would, that she would be his big sister and take care of him no matter what.

"We'll find out when we get to California." Michael told her. He could tell what was going through his sisters mind though. "They can't put him into care, Abs, don't worry, he's got too much family to do that."

She nodded and stared out the window again. They had just arrived at her house. The first thing she did when she got inside was pick up the phone in the kitchen. Michael was her brother, but she needed Ben right now. She needed him with her as well. She rang the university.

"Professor Gates's office." Answered the receptionist she knew to be Nora.

"Hi Nora, its Abigail." She asid sombrely. "I need to speak to Ben."

"Good afternoon, Doctor Chase, I'll patch you through straight away."

"Thank you." She waited until she heard Ben's familiar voice on the other end. The sound of him talking threatened to bring her tears back.

"Abigail?" She choked on a sob as he spoke, which he heard loud and clear. "Abigail, what's wrong?"

"Ben." She said, her voice breaking a little. "Can you come home please?" She didn't know what else to say. Michael had been right when he was saying that he couldn't talk about it over the phone. She felt her brother's reassuring hands on her shoulders.

"Abi, sweetheart what's the matter, what's happened?"

"I need you here, Ben. Michael's here too, but please, come home."

The sound of her pleading voice was enough for Ben, and he told her he would be home as soon as possible. Abigail hung up the phone and turned round and held herself against her brother as she cried.

"How could they do this to us?" She asked. "How could they leave us like this? Leave Ryan?"

Michael sighed and let her cry all she wanted. "It was an accident Abs, they didn't mean for it to happen." The two siblings stood there, crying, hugging each other as though scared that they would disappear too. Their parents had always been there for them, but they wouldn't be there for Ryan like they had been for them. He was only young, would he forget them one day? No. She wouldn't let him. They were brilliant parents. No one would forget what they had sacrificed for them.

She couldn't stop herself from crying, and eventually, the weight of all her grief caused her knees to fall from underneath her, and she sat down on one of the nearby chairs in the kitchen. She hadn't known how long she had been crying until she felt another pair of arms around her, not Michael's. She heard Ben's comforting voice in her ear, and knew that he had come home. She held onto him tightly, not caring how weak or pathetic she looked for doing so. She had every right to look a mess. She had every right to be upset. She pulled her head up from Ben's shoulder and looked him in the eye.

As she looked up at him, he felt so useless. He had never seen her so upset. Her eyes were red and puffy from tears that still fell down her face, and he wanted nothing more that to take her away from whatever pain was causing this to his wife.

"Ben." She said, her voice still sounding like she was about to cry once again. "They're gone, Ben. They're gone." She said, a new batch of tears making their way down her face.

"Who's gone?" He asked her in a whisper, pushing back the hair that was sticking to her wet face and securing it behind her ear.

"There was an accident...no chance." She wept.

"Abi, who's gone?" He asked her gently. "What happened?"

"Mom and Dad."

Oh god, he thought. Understanding what had happened. She started crying again, and he held her tightly, rubbing her back, holding back his own tears. Her parents were wonderful people, not ones who deserved this end. They had welcomed him into their family. but he did not grieve himself. His job now was to help Abigail. Their daughter, his wife. She was distraught, and there was not much he could do to help. Michael had left the room when he had arrived, and when Abigail stopped crying half an hour later, he reappeared.

"Ben." Michael said quietly, not like his usual happy self. No wonder. "We need to go to California straight away. Ryan needs us."

Ben nodded. He knew that by 'we' he meant him as well. If his only use in this situation was to comfort Abigail, then that was enough for him. She needed help, she couldn't get through this on her own.


	4. Baby, Be Brave

_James Chase entered the room where he saw Michael and Marcus standing with Abigail, who had a two year old Ryan on her lap. He smiled when he saw them sitting together, his children. Abigail looked up when he came in and stood up, Ryan sliding off her lap. He gave her the once over look and smiled. "You look beautiful Abigail." He told her, giving his only daughter a hug._

_"Thanks Dad, I feel a bit silly though." She said straightening out a few creases in the skirt of her white dress. _

_"Oh no you do not!" James assured her. "You look just like your mother."_

_Abigail blushed and turned to look in a mirror nearby. "I'd be suprised if Ben didn't run away when I go down there." She said. _

_"Oh stop it." Her father told her with a broad grin._

_"Yeah, the only reason he's run away was if I walked out there in that dress." Michael added. _

_She laughed at the image of her brother in a dress about to get married to Ben. _

_"Who better to marry my daughter," James began proudly, "Than a charming, wonderful man who would risk his own life to save hers." Abigail smiled and hugged her father again. _

"Abi, wake up, honey."

Ben's voice interrupted her dream, and she momentarily forgot where she was. She looked around her and saw people leaving the plane, telling her that it had landed. On one side of her Ben was reaching up to get their bags, and on her other side, Michael was doing the same thing. They had arrived in California, where they would now go to their aunts house and get Ryan. For some reason, the idea almost killed her of having to see her brother's heartbroken face. She stood up and took her bag from Ben, following her brother off the plane and into the sunshine.

By the time they had reached their Aunt's house, Abigail was a nervous wreck in the car Michael had rented. She sat in the back with Ben, and Michael sat alone in the front. "Well, here we are." Michael said, looking down the road at their parents house. It stood empty, but still looking the same as when he had last seen it.

"Let's go get him." Abigail whispered to herself as she took a deep breath, getting out the car.

When Aunt Elsa opened the door, she looked sympathetically down at the two siblings. She took Abigail into her arms quickly and gave her a quick hug as she passed silently through the door, and caught Michael in the same way as he tried to get through also. Ben got a friendly pat on the shoulder, which was fine for him, seeing as the other two seemed to have had their breath squeezed out of them.

The went first of all into the kitchen. "Ryan's at his childcare group still." Elsa told them, putting the kettle on as the other sat down at the table. Ben sat beside Abigail, putting his hand over hers reassuringly. She gripped it for comfort and he gently ran his thumb along the inside of her hands. "We tried to keep everything normal for him, told him that his parents were visiting friends in Texas..."

"What?" Abigail asked, replaying what Elsa had said in her head.

"He doesn't know!" Michael cried out.

Elsa sighed. "We couldn't find it in our hearts to tell him, so we thought it would be best to wait until you two were here for him. He will need you."

Abigail understood. If places were changed, she wouldn't have wanted to be the one to tell her nephew that his parents were dead. Especially as he was only five years old, and his only experience of death had been a dead rabbit.

Elsa continued talking, the keetle boiled. "Do you want tea?" She asked. Michael and Ben nodded, but Abigail shook her head. "We got together the other night, your uncle Danny, and Mari and Jack, and talked about Ryan." She said almost awkwardly. "We decided that, although this is his home, and if it was any problem, he is fine to stay with us, but we think it may be best for him if he lived with one of you."

Abigail looked at Michael. That would mean moving thousands of miles away, depending on who he was with. Marcus wouldn't have him. He would refuse straight away, he had a business up in Canada that he rarely spoke about, but told them that it was 'dangerous'. Michael was travelling all the time, so that would be no way for him to grow up. Which left her...

She turned to Ben, who returned her gaze. But no words were spoken between them, as the front door opened, followed by footsteps running through the halls. "That'll be your uncle with Ryan now." Elsa said, taking them through to the living room.

Michael and Abigail stopped though. "Abs, I-"

"It's all right, Mike, I'll tell him." She said softly.

Michael looked at her sympathetically. "Abs,"

"No, it's fine. I'll do it." She have him the falsest smile she had used in her life, but it assured him somewhat, and they followed Elsa into the living room.

When they had sat down, the running footsteps stopped in the doorway, and a small boy with sandy hair and blue eyes, exactly like Abigail's, looked at them for a moment before running over to Abigail and throwing himself at her. She caught him in her lap, and he laughed. "Abi!" He cried excitedly. "You've come to see us."

She felt sad when he said 'us', knowing that he meant their parents as well, but she smiled at him. "Yes, sweetie, I have." She saw Michael looking at her but she didn't look back. "Listen, Ryan, there's something I need to talk to you about." She told him, standing up. "Can you come in the garden with me?"

Ryan nodded, and followed Abigail into the garden. He climbed onto the bench and sat down, Abigail knelt on the floor in front of her little brother. She looked into his eyes, and found herself getting upset again. _No one should have to do this _she thought, _he's too young, this shouldn't be happening. _

"Am I in trouble?" He asked with a small frown. Abigail gave him a false smile.

"No, Ryan, you're not in trouble."

"Why do you look sad?" He asked her, touching her face with his small hands, covered in green pen from where he had been colouring earlier that day.

"Ryan, I need to tell you something very important." She told him. "Now, there's going to be a lot of sad things happening soon, but it's all going to be fine, because I'm here, and Michael's here, and Marcus will be here soon, and we're going to take care of you, OK?" He nodded to show he understood her.

"Won't Mommy and Daddy be here?" He asked her.

Abigail's heart nearly broke when he said that. "Ryan, do you remember when your rabbit died went to heaven?" She asked him.

"Daddy said it was a place where he would be happy and have all the carrots he wanted." Ryan recited.

"That's right."

"Will Mommy and Daddy be home soon?" He asked. "I miss them."

"No, Ryan. Mommy and Daddy aren't coming home." She told him, tears coming out from her eyes. Ryan looked so confused.

"Why?" He asked.

"Because they've gone to Heaven, sweetie. They had an accident and they went to heaven." She was starting to wish that she had let Michael do this. But he had already had to break the news to her, to tell Ryan as well would be too hard for him. Somehow, telling her brother was harder than hearing it herself.

"They're not coming home?" He asked her. "Never?"

"I'm sorry Ryan, no." She told him.

"Did I make them mad?" He asked her.

"Of course not. You didn't do anything wrong sweetie." She assured him, and she watched his eyes fill with tears like her own.

"Then why have they gone away from me?" He asked her, starting to cry. Abigail put her arms around him, and moved so she was sitting on the bench with him in her lap. He curled up close to her and cried.

"Sometimes, people have to go away." She explained. "We don't want them to, but they have to. I know you miss them, and I miss them too. But we're going to look after you Ryan. Everything's going to be fine, I promise." She hadn't realised that she was crying, but she tried to hold her tears back. She needed to be strong for Ryan, for the little boy who was looking to her for dependancy.

He cried for ages in her arms, until Michael came out into the garden with them. Ryan was always closest to Abigail and Michael because they were most like their parents. So when Michael sat down beside them, Ryan moved into his lap, and Abigail rested her head on his shoulder. Together they sat in grief, while Elsa sat watching in the window with Ben.

"He is a lucky boy." Elsa told him. "It couldn't have happened to a nicer family, but at least they still have each other."

"I feel so helpless." Ben told the aging woman. "I want to help, but there's only so much I can do."

"Ryan has always loved his sister more than his brothers." Elsa remembered. "It was no secret. She would always try to be a good sister to him, ever since the day he was born. Now he is torn."

"Torn?" Ben asked.

"Marcus won't have him. His work is too dangerous. Whatever it is that silly fool does. Michael is always travelling, and young Abigail lives all the way over in Washington. He needs to be with one of them." Elsa said.

Ben nodded. "They need him as much as he needs them." He observed from the way the siblings clung to each other.

"We've arranged the funeral for Friday. Until then, you and Abigail are welcome to stay either here or at their old house." Elsa told him.

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me, dear. It's the least I can do."

Abigail sat on the couch with her legs curled beneath her later that night. Her back was leaning againt Ben's chest, and Ryan lay asleep over her lap. She subconsciously played with his hair, the blonde curls that made him so adorable. He had not left her side all day. He hadn't eaten, and hadn't played, nor had he spoken since Abigail broke the awful news to him. She felt so much guilt having told him, and she understood how hard it was for Michael to tell her. Michael sat in the corner with a glass of wine, staring at the television set as though it might add some enlightenment to the situation. Elsa was in the kitchen with her husband Danny, and Abigail whispered up to Ben.

"He looks peaceful when he's asleep, not like one who has just lost his parents." She said, her eyes never leaving her brother's face. "And his home."

"He still has his brothers and sister." He reminded her. "If he needs a home, we'll give him one." Ben told her.

She looked up at him with an unreadable face. "You wouldn't mind?" She asked him.

"Of course not, he's your brother. He needs you with him. We're the only ones who have a home suitable for a kid."

Abigail gave Ben a thankful look, and kissed him. "You have no idea how much easier this makes it." She told him, and he put his arm around her. _Now, we've just got to get through Friday._


	5. Hiding the Pain

Once the television programme had ended, Abigail moved away from Ben. She lifted her brother into her arms, and carried Ryan upstairs, taking him to bed. No one questioned her leaving, but she was previously very comfortable in Ben's assuring arms. His arms had always taken away any problem for her; he was even making her parent's death less horrific than it seemed to everyone else. Though, this was perhaps because she was the only one who had someone to turn to. Michael had always travelled alone, and Marcus, well, no one knew what Marcus was doing.

She set her sleeping brother in his bed, and pulled the blanket over him. It was a strange old patterned cover, the sort that aunts usually had in their guest rooms. She had never understood why Elsa had taken a house with so many rooms, but she was thankful for it now. Michael was going to be sleeping in the other spare bed in the room with Ryan, Abigail and Ben were sharing the double room next to it, and Marcus was on the other side, with the other single room - once he showed up, that is.

_Where is he? _Abigail wondered desperately. Marcus had never been as family orientated as the rest of them growing up. He had left for Canada to work without a second thought, and wouldn't have said goodbye to them if they hadn't followed him to the airport the day he left. When Ryan was born, he even claimed he was 'too busy' to come and see him and their parents, and had finally got the time of work when Ryan was six months old. She had never been that close to Marcus, preferring Michael's company, but now, she needed him more than ever. _We're supposed to be family. He should be here with us. Why isn't he here already?_

She watched Ryan sleeping with a new fascination. She had always sworn to be the best big sister for him, and she still stood by that. She visited him all the time, and he had taken to Ben and Riley better than he had ever done with Marcus, which annoyed her oldest brother considerably. Of course, after two years of being married, he sometimes reminded her of what she did not yet have and longed for so much. Now, without warning, she had been thrown into motherhood. The four of them were now orphans, but Ryan still needed parents. Her and her older brothers would cope, and eventually the shock and loss would fade, but Ryan was so young; he still needed to be cared for. _And I'm going to do it, _she thought with determination.

After Abigail had disappeared, Ben had decided to follow suit, and sensed that Abigail would need some comfort away from her brothers, aunt and uncle. When he got upstairs however, she wasn't in the room that he knew they were sleeping in. Looking ahead, he saw the light turned on and the door open in Ryan's current room. He went to the door, and for a moment he waited in the doorway. Seeing Abigail kneeling beside the bed with tears in her eyes made his heart break for her. He heard her whispering to him.

"It's going to be all right, Ryan." She began softly. "I know it's going to be hard. But we'll get there together. We're going to look after you, me and Ben. You can come and live with us, and we'll try to look after you as well as Mom and Dad did, we'll try as hard as we can. I'm sorry that this is happening. No one wanted it to happen, especially not to you." She brushed his curls away from his sleeping face. "But we'll be ok. We have to be. We have each other." She dipped her head and wiped tears away from her cheeks, ashamed of crying again, and then kissed him gently upon the forehead. "You'll always have me, no matter what."

Ben moved from the doorway and into the room, and Abigail noticed his presense. She knew straight away that he had heard most, if not all, of what she just said. He crouched on the floor beside her, and she went to wipe her tears again but he took hand in his as she attempted this. His other arm went around her shoulders, tightening securly and her head rolled onto his shoulder.

"Come on," he whispered, not wanting to wake Ryan. "It's been a long day, you need some sleep." He started to move, but Abigail didn't follow, she stayed still, her tiredness showing. Without a second thought, Ben lifted her up. She wrapped her legs around his waist, and her arms snaked around his neck, allowing her to bury her face further into his shoulder. He carried her into their room, and sat down on the edge of the bed. She was sitting in his lap now, the way that a crying child would to their parent, but he didn't mind. If it was helping her in any way, he was willing to do it.

"Why is this happening to us?" She asked against his shoulder.

Ben used one hand to rest on her back, and the other stroked her hair softly. "I don't know," he answered. "I honestly don't know."

She sniffed, and he knew that she was trying not to cry. "This is silly," she said, pulling away from Ben's shoulder and looking down at the small space between them. "I can't keep doing this all the time. Ryan needs me to be strong, it'll scare him if he sees me crying all the time."

Ben put his finger under her chin and lifted her face gently so she was level with him. She kept her eyes away from his. "Look at me, Abi." She swallowed, and after a few faltering seconds, she locked his gaze. "Don't lock yourself away like this." He begged her. "Don't shut off your emotions. Yes, he needs you to be strong, and you are being strong, just by being there for him, by being the one he turns to. You're taking him in, Abigail, you're making sure he has a home still, what can you do that is stronger than that?" Her eyes wandered again and Ben kissed her cheek. "I can't imagine what it's like to lose both your parents at the same time, and believe me, seeing you in so much pain and knowing that there's only so much I can do to help you is the worst feeling I've ever had; but even if you hide your pain from everybody else, please don't think you have to hide it from me." He pushed the strands of hair which were plastered to her wet cheek away, tucking them safely behind her ear.

Abigail looked into his eyes again. She was thankful that he was there with her, that he had come with her to California. She needed him to keep herself going at the moment, to remind her that life was still good underneath the loss. "Thank you." She muttered, even though she didn't have to keep her voice so low any more.

"You don't need to thank me for anything." Ben replied, running his hand over her golden hair again, smoothing it down unecessarily. "I'd do anything for you."

She gave him a small smile, one that finally reached her eyes. He gave her a smile back, and kissed her again. After pulling away, she rested her head on his shoulder again, this time not in shame, but in tiredness. She sighed heavily, the telltale sign that she had found somewhere comfortable and was ready to sleep, a sign that Ben recognised instantly now. He pulled back the blanket on the bed and laid her down, covering her up again afterwards. Then he removed his jeans, leaving his t-shirt and underwear on, and climbed into bed beside his wife. She rolled onto her side as he wrapped his arms around her, puling her close to him.

"I love you." She said softly, as her eyes closed.

"I love you too." He replied, and within a few minutes at the most, she was asleep, and, like her brother, away from the pain.

The following morning, Abigail awoke to find Ben playing with the ends of her hair, curling them around his fingers before releasing it and doing the same again. He sat for hours doing it sometimes. "Morning." She greeted, her voice thick with sleep, also cracked with the torrents of tears she had shed yesterday. He kissed her in reply.

"Good morning to you too." He replied.

Her stomach groaned, not out of hunger, but it caused an odd stirring, which brought a ill expression over her face.

"Abi?" Ben asked, "What's the matter?"

She felt the strange sensation in her stomach intensify, and rushed out of the bed. Her head span from standing up to quickly, but she managed to reach the bathroom across the hall before she collapsed to the floor and vomited into the toilet. Ben pulled on his jeans from the previous day and gathered her robe from their suitcase, and followed her. When he found her vomitting, knelt on the floor behind her, and threaded his fingers through her hair, keeping it out of the way as she leaned forward against the toilet bowl.

After throwing up the contents of what little food she had in her stomach, she sat back against Ben's chest, and Ben let her slightly ruffled hair fall upon her shoulders. He turned to the sink beside them and filled a perfectly placed cup with water from the tap and handed it to her. "You all right?" He asked as she sipped from the cup, putting the robe around her shoulders as she began to shake from the sudden cold.

She shrugged. "I think so." She answered, slightly confused. "I didn't feel ill until a few minutes ago."

"It might be the stress." Ben reminded her, unable to think of any other reason. She hadn't eaten much, so it was unlikely to be bad food, and she hadn't been drinking, so it was obviously the stress and shock of losing her parents.

"Maybe." She partially agreed. "Unless..no. No."

"What?" Ben asked.

She shook her head, almost nervously. "Nothing. It's nothing." She took a longer drink and then looked at the floor.

"Abigail." Ben said, "Don't try the 'nothing' trick with me. I can see right through it now."

She smirked at him, "You know me too well."

He nodded. "That's what comes from being married." He reached out and took her hand, running his thumb over the wedding ring upon her finger. "So?"

"So what?"

"What was this 'unless..' all about?"

She looked around the room uncertainly. "I'm not certain, so don't get your hopes up again." She told him first.

"Again? Abi-"

"My period was due two weeks ago. I haven't had it yet, and the month before completely skipped, so I'm about six weeks late now." Ben's eyebrows almost shot through the ceiling, had she not been feeling quite the same, she would probably have laughed at his expression. "I was under a lot of stress at work, and then when that stopped we got called out here, so it could be down to stress. But now I've been ill a couple of times, and there's definately something different in my mind right now, I'm starting to think that, maybe, well, I might be pregnant."


	6. If

**Ok, this is only a short one to add tension (if there wasn't enough at the end of the last chapter). Thanks as always to my wonderful reviewers! I couldn't write this without knowing that you all like it! Enjoy!**

**Sam**

**xx**

Two days before the funeral, and Abigail and Ben sat side by side on the bed. She had been to buy a test the night before, and they had waited until everyone had gone to meet Marcus from the airport to do it. She wasn't fussed about going to meet her brother; he was already in her bad books for not coming sooner. So she had stayed at her aunts house with Ben.

Which was resulting in the longest three minutes of their lives.

They had left the test on the bedside table to Abigail's right hand side, not wanting to see until it was clear, and had taken to sitting nervously together. Immediately after they sat, she found his hand and gripped it tightly. "This is it." She said anxiously. "Scared?" She asked him.

"Terrified. Has it been three minutes yet?" He asked in reply. She shook her head.

"Nowhere near." She said impatiently.

"It's weird." Ben said into the silence that followed. "For the past few weeks, we might have been parents, and we haven't known it."

Abigail thought this over. She had hoped this from the day her period didn't arrive, yet they had had too many let downs now for her to be as excited as the first time. The first time, it had been positive, and three weeks later, she had lost the baby. The second, third and fourth times had all been negative. It was a wonder that she didn't want to get her hopes up.

"You know, I think we might do it this time." She said, a look of hope spreading over her face.

"Me too." Ben agreed. He placed his free hand over their clasped ones and gripped tightly. Ben had been equally distraught over the miscarriage last year, and having to walk into the hospital ward where he passed five other wailing women and their husbands who had also lost their children, and then seeing Abigail as one of them, was the worst day of his life."Something's definately different this time."

"You mean besides the fact that we aren't in our bedroom?" She asked, trying to pass the time quicker, even though her attempts weren't working.

"Yes besides that. Has it been three minutes now?"

"No." She replied, after checking her watch again. "Two and a half minutes." There was another silence, and Abigail began to feel sick with anticipation. She had never been so nervous to check the test. She had been excited, scared, worried, but never nervous...at least, not this nervous. "Ben." She began quietly. He turned his head to look at her, but she wasn't looking at him. "If the - if I am pregnant, I'll do better this time." She said awkwardly.

"Abigail-"

"No, Ben." She interrupted him, knowing what he was going to say. "The baby was dependant on me, it had to be my fault in some way. We're not loosing this one too." She raised her eyes to look at him. He met her gaze with his loving eyes, and he put his around her waist.

"Whatever we do, we'll do it together." He assured her. "After all, we're going to be a family."

Family. That word meant a lot to her at the moment. One part of hers was falling apart, while another might be beginning. It was rather cliche really. She leaned her head against Ben's shoulder and he kissed the top of her head. "Its not fair." She whispered.

"What isn't?" Ben asked.

"How can some irresponsible people go out and get pregnant from one night stands and waste that precious life with an abortion, when people like us have to wait so long to have a child that we're going to love no matter what?" She asked in barely more than a whisper, but there was a tinge of jealousy in her words for those people who had what she wanted so much. "Is it too much to ask for a baby with the man I love?"

She was right. It wasn't fair. Some people were having children that they gave up, or treated badly, or whom they didn't even _try _to love. It was something that made them both angry. They just wanted to have a child with the person they loved; a living symbol of how much they cared for each other. "We're gonna get our baby, Abi," He said determinedly. "Who knows," he rested his hand over her stomach, "we might already have them."

With his hand over her stomach, and the hope that beneath his touch there was a child, _their _child, the next minute and a half passed quicker in the silence. As they watched Abigail's watch eagerly, she got butterflies in her stomach, Ben's palm's began to feel sweaty with excitement. Eventually, after the longest three minutes of their lives. The three minutes was up. Taking a deep breath, Abigail took the test strip in her hand and closed her eyes.

"What does it say?" Ben asked. She took a deeper breath, and opened her eyes to look at the result.

**DUN DUN DUN! I could be really evil and leave it at this for ages, but with the fear that Toxic-Beetle would come after me with the poisoned spag-bol, I'll just wait to see some responses before I post another chapter up. Let me know what you think, is she pregnant? Will it go horrible wrong like last time if she did? Or was their three minutes of waiting in vain? **


	7. Shot Throught The Heart

**Thanks, as always to my reviewers! I love you all and couldn't review without you! Also, if anyone is interested, I have posted up an Italian Job fic in the miscellaneous section. I'll warn you, there's an arguement in this chapter. I mean a real big clash - sibling rivalry at it's worst. Abigail really lets rip. Just goes to show that I shouldn't write when I'm angry, oh well, enough with the babbeling, on with the chapter:  
Sam  
xx**

"What does it say?" Ben asked her. Opening her eyes, she looked down. She gasped, and covered her mouth with her free hand. "Abigail?"

"Oh my god."

"Abi?"

"Oh my god, Ben." She turned to face him and threw her arms around his neck, looking deeply into his eyes and smiling. He smiled back, if only because he had finally seen a smile through the last few days which had reached her eyes.

"Are you going to tell me already?" He asked grinning, "I don't think it's fair that you know and I don't!"

She kissed him deeply, and he found his answer. "Ben," She whispered afterwards. "We're gonna have a baby. It's positive, Ben, it's positive!"

They embraced tightly, and the test strip was discarded on the floor, and everything that had happened the past week had been forgotten. Nothing else mattered at that moment except that they had finally got what they wanted.

"We're gonna have a baby." Ben repeated. "I'm gonna be a dad."

The excitement in his eyes resembled a kid at christmas, surrounded by presents. Unable to stop grinning, he placed his hands back on Abigail's stomach, trying to feel the new life inside. He looked back up at Abigail's who's eyes were shining, yet these were not tears of pain as before, but ones of joy. _The only tears I ever want to see her shed, _Ben thought. Abigail placed her hand over his own, unable to believe that for the past month or so, there had been a child there and she hadn't known.

"We did it, Abi." Ben said with a laugh. "We did it."

Seated in the garden upon a bench, Abigail leaned against Ben, her head cradled between his neck and shoulder, and trailed her toes betweent the blades of well-cared-for grass. She felt guilty now. She couldn't stop thinking about the baby, even though it was pushing her parents death out of her mind, for which she felt torn. She was supposed to be focusing on the funeral, on keeping her brother's together, on keeping herself together, but it didn't seem like it was happening at the moment. She sighed heavily, and rubbed her hand over her stomach. _God, I've known that I'm pregnant for just over an hour and I'm already feeling maternal. _Truth been told, she had been feeling maternal ever since she had seen Ryan and taken him into the garden, but she wasn't prepared to admit that. After all, she wasn't his mother, she was his sister.

"You tired?" Ben asked her softly, his lips tracing her ear as he whispered. She shook her head.

"I feel...torn." She admitted. "I know I should be thinking of Mom and Dad all the time, and I have been, but not all I want to think about is us and the baby. Is that selfish of me?"

"Of course not," Ben assured her. "You need something to keep you going through all of this, Abi, and right now that's two things: your family, and our family." She shifted her head on his shoulder, so she could look up him as he spoke. "Your parents wanted this for you as much as you did, Abi, remember that."

She remembered the conversations she had had with her parents when they had come to see her in the hospital after she had lost the baby.

_"I can't even begin to imagine how you feel, Petal." Petal had always been one of Abigail's nicknames from her father, ever since she was little and loved to sit amongst the flowers in their garden. Whenever she was angry or upset, she could always be found in the garden near her favourite flowers, the rosebush that blossomed every year since she helped her father plant it. James Chase was the only one who could get away with calling her Petal, she would allow that special nickname from no one else except her father. _

_She lay in the hospital bed. Ben was beside her on the bed, one leg pulled up upon the mattress while the other hang from the edge. His arms were wrapped around her, and she refused to let go of him, not wanting him to leave her. Her face was puffy from crying, and her eyes were distant and empty of all emotion except pain. "I didn't think it was possible to feel this bad." She whispered, tears in her voice that still flowed silently with the knowledge that the life that had been inside her was gone forever. Ben stroked her hair softly, he looked as bad as she felt, but was still trying everything he could to comfort her. _

_James came around to the side of the bed opposite where Ben sat, and placed his hand on Abigail's shoulder while sitting down before her. Ben released her hold on him and for the first time that day, she sat up and moved to embrace her father. Her tears soaked the shoulder of his grey jacket, but he didn't mind. Amanda Chase rested her hand on Ben's knee, giving him a look that asked if he was all right, but he shook his head. _

_"I just wanted to be a Mom." Abigail whimpered against her father's shoulder. "I don't understand, what did I do wrong?"_

_Amanda reached and rubbed Abigail's back as she sat with her father. "It's going to be all right, sweetheart." Amanda assured her. _

_"How do you know that?" Abigail asked, looking at her mother with her tear-stained face._

_"Because you're strong, and you have Ben," She looked at Ben, "And you both have each other, and that's what matters." Abigail pulled away from her father's shoulder, turning to face Ben, who kissed her gently, reminding her unnecessarily that he was there. She sank back against the pillows, exhausted, hiding herself in Ben's shirt, and gripping his hand tightly with her tear covered hands. "When you were younger, Abigail, your kindergarten teacher asked you what you wanted to be when you grew up." Abigail kept her head on Ben's chest, but opened her eyes, looking out the window even though the blinds were shut. "No one could make up their mind, except for you."_

_"Do you remember what you said?" James asked her._

_Abigail shook her head a little. "No."_

_"You said you wanted to be a Mommy." Amanda told her. "You said you were going to be the best mother in the world, and you didn't want to do anything else, until you got your job at the Archives."_

_"But even then we could see you still wanted to be a mother." James added. "And since the day you came home with your doll, telling us, we didn't want anything else for you."_

"I guess so," Abigail agreed after remembering. "I just can't help feeling guilty though," She argued. "Here I am, dealing with death, and all I can think about is life."

Ben kissed her. "Don't worry, everything's going to turn out OK. Ryan's going to have his family still, you're going to have your brothers with you, and you're going to be a Mom, just like you always wanted."

No matter what the situation, Ben always knew what to say to make her feel better. Sometimes, he didn't have to say anything, and just being there was enough to make everything bearable. "And I've got you." She added to his list.

"You've always got me."

"Abi!" Came the shouting voice of Ryan as he came into the garden and jumped onto her lap. She shifted carefully before he managed to land, so she caused no risk of him landing on the baby he didn't know was there, but he landed on her legs instead.

"Hi sweetie," She greeted with a smile.

"Abi! You're smiling!" Ryan said, smiling himself. He had overheard Michael and Abigail talking amongst themselves yesterday about how she hadn't smiled in ages. "Michael said that Ben would make you smile, he told me, he did."

"Did he?" Abigail asked, relieved that Ryan had stopped his unspoken vow of silence around her. He spoke a little to Michael, and he didn't speak at all to Elsa and Danny, but he spoke to her, and occassionally Ben as much as her. "Yes, Ben did make me smile."

"How?" Ryan asked.

"Yes, Abigail." Michael said curiously, coming up behind them and kissing Abigail on the cheek. "How did dear old Ben make you smile."

"Not how you think." She chided at his rude mind.

"Abigail. Ben." A deep voice greeted. Marcus came and stood beside Michael, but he did not embrace or kiss Abigail's cheek as Michael would always do, and Ben could see the instant tension between the two, which was not suprising considering the coversation they had had over the phone the previous night. She had been using the kitchen phone, but Michael and Ben had heard it from the living room. Luckily, Ryan was asleep in bed and hadn't heard anything, but afterwards Marcus had given in and got on the first available plan to California. From what Michael had told Ben during the phonecall, Marcus hated giving in to Abigail, and would never do it when she was younger, whether she yelled at him, which was a rarity, or not. Ben had secretly thought that thier parents death would have brought them together, not torn them apart even more.

"Marcus," Ben nodded in greeting, more cheerfully than Marcus, maybe just in spite of him. Abigail did not turn, nor did she greet him, and instead carried on talking to Ryan as if her oldest brother had never arrived.

"Did you have fun at the airport, sweetie?" She asked him, her smile fading considerably now that Marcus was there.

Ryan nodded awkwardly, sensing the tension between his brother and sister. "Michael, where is my book? I want to show Abi." He asked his brother. Michael thought hard for a moment, trying to remember what he had done with it.

"I think it's still in the car. If you hurry, Uncle Danny might not have locked it yet." Ryan nodded and slipped from Abigail's lap, running back through the house calling after his uncle.

Michael sat on the bench beside Abigail, but Marcus chose to sit on the wall opposite them instead. Ben was now counting down the moments before another outburst occured. Marcus looked considerably angry. "Elsa brought Ryan a book on Egyptians," Michael explained. "He wants to work in a museum like his sister." No one answered. Ben was too busy staring between his wife and her brother, wondering who's fuse was going to ignite first.

"Michael tells me that you're going to take Ryan in." Marcus stated coolly.

"Yes," Abigail confirmed lightly. "Me and Ben are going to look after him."

"His home is here, Abigail. His home is in California."

"Uh oh." Michael muttered, Ben looked sideways at his brother-in-law, and got the confirming look that the argument was going to begin again.

"Which was the home he shared with Mom and Dad, but they're not here anymore, are they!" Abigail pointed out heatedly. "Maybe if you'd gotten here sooner you'd have been able to sort this out with us. But no, as usual, it's up to me and Michael to look out for Ryan."

"You say that like I don't care what's happened." Marcus said quietly.

"Do you?" Abigail's question shocked the three of them. Seeing them all look at her she whispered bitterly, "Everyone's thinking it, I'm just saying it."

"Of course I care! They were our parents!"

One thing that had annoyed Abigail considerably on the phone with Marcus the night before was how he was already reffering to their parents in the past tense. "They still are our parents!" She said loudly. "And they always will be! A parent once - a parent for life!" It was a line that she had repeated many times on the phone last night, and one that Michael remembered that their mother used to say a lot in regard to her children. Only today, it meant so much more to Abigail, but only Ben knew this.

"Stop saying that Abigail!" Marcus yelled at her. "You're not Mom!"

"If it means something to me, I'll say it!" She said back, not yelling like Marcus was.

"Guys, maybe we should keep this down a little-" Michael began, but Marcus looked at him with the same anger he was projecting at Abigail and Michael's voice rose as well. "Oh for God's sake, Marcus! Stop yelling at her!" Michael said loudly, not shouting, but enough to make their brother realise that he wasn't going to let him push Abigail around. "This is about what's best for Ryan."

"What's best for Ryan? He's best off here! With his family!"

"His family? You mean the brother that's travelling, the brother that he barely knows, or the sister who's his best hope?" Michael asked rhetorically. "He will be with his family!"

"What about the rest of his family?" Marcus asked.

"Don't you _dare _suggest that I'm going to keep him away from any of you." Abigail said with such bitterness that it rose the hairs on the back of Ben's neck. "If he says the word, I'll bring him straight away to see any of you, no questions asked." Abigail promised, looking away from Marcus. "If it's what he want's, then that's what it'll be."

They all fell silent, and none of them looked at each other except Abigail and Ben.

"And you think you can raise a child?" Marcus asked teasingly.

Abigail looked away from Ben with fire in her eyes as she returned her fury to Marcus. In that moment, Ben finally understood the line that Riley said every time Abigail got mad, which was rare: _Heav'n has no rage, like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury, like a woman scorned. _He had never seen her so angry, so hurt, than when Marcus taunted her that moment. "What did you just say?" She asked him in disbelief.

"You heard me. You're still the child you were twenty years ago! You don't have any experience of motherhood."

"No experience?" She asked. Tears prickled her eyes, but she refused to cry. She wouldn't let Marcus get to her like this. "Marcus-"

"Don't play the sympathy one with me, Abigail. We all know that you want a baby, but wanting a child doesn't make you a mother. You couldn't be a mother even if some miracle made it happen. Because that's what it's going to take for anyone in their right mind to let you look after a kid, a miracle!" Right now, both men wanted to pounce on Marcus and beat him senseless.

Unable to listen to anything else, Abigail stood up and walked away. She didn't trust herself being within a mile of Marcus without trying to hurt him for what he just said. Ben was only a few steps behind her as they disappeared into the house once again. Michael looked after them, before staring at Marcus in disbelief.

"You stupid asshole!" Michael cried out. "How can you say something like that to her?"

"What?"

"Marcus, maybe if it had occured to you to keep in touch with your family, you would have known what has happened to her." Michael explained desperately, ashamed to be Marcus's brother right now. He stood up, going to follow Abigail. "Maybe if you had spoken to any of us in the past year, you would have known about Abigail's miscarriage."

Leaving a stunned Marcus to think about his thoughts, Michael followed Abigail and Ben. With only a day left before the funeral, it didn't seem like the family ties were going to be as tight as they needed to be.


	8. Because Of You

**Thanks, as always, for the reviews. I see that a lot of people hate Marcus now, (who can blame you? I created him and I hate his guts!) but I have had some questions regarding to why he doesn't want to take Ryan in himself, but doesn't want Abigail to take him. It will be revealed in a later chapter, but just to clear things up, I will say now that something happened in their childhood that caused Marcus too lose all trust in Abigail, even though she was only very young, and he has always treated her badly because of it. **

**Also, there is mention of an Aunt Marion in this chapter. She is very much on the same side as Marcus when it comes to Abigail. Abigail has done some rather unfortunate things to her, mentioned in this chapter, which were actually things I did to my own aunt when I was younger, and I just thought it would be good to see Abigail having a rather rebellious and reckless side when she was a child.**

**Sam**

**xx**

It was no suprise to any of them that Abigail refused to eat dinner that night. She didn't want to be anywhere near Marcus. It was like they were five years old and had been arguing over their favourite toy, but on a much greater scale. Everytime Marcus came into the room, Abigail would leave, and when he tried to apologize later that evening as Elsa prepared dinner, she refused to listen to a word he said, telling him that what he said was unforgivable. She had sat watching Ben play a games console with Ryan which they had retrieved that afternoon from their parent's house, occassionally, Michael would play the winner of a match on the racing game, but it was nearly always Ryan who won, seeing as it took Ben at least an hour just to figure out which buttons to press to go forward, and Michael just let Ryan win for the sake of it.

Marcus had stayed out in the garden most of the time, speaking with Danny whilst he did some gardening, much to Abigail's happiness after everything he said to her. When Ben tried to comfort her she ignored him, as she did to Michael as well, insisting she was fine, even though they both knew what 'fine' meant to Abigail; and it wasn't good.

Abigail sat on the couch with Ryan, who was reading aloud from his Egyptian book which he had brought from the airport. She occassionally had to correct him on the pronounciation of a word, particularly the names, but other than that, he was showing a capability of reading that was more advanced than hers at that age, if that were possible. She could remember Marcus berating her for her reading, saying that it wasn't good for women to have an imagination. _He's a sexist pig really, _she thought.

Marcus walked through the room with Danny, but before Abigail even made her move to get up, he disappeared into the kitchen, so she simply avoided his gaze when he looked at her, and continued listening to Ryan. She could smell the food coming from the kitchen now; spaghetti bolognase, one of her favourite meals, and her aunt's cooking was near legendary; but Abigail wasn't hungry, at least, not hungry enough to sit with Marcus and eat. Elsa appeared in the doorway with a tea-towel in her hands, drying them off as she called them in.

"Your tea's ready you guys." Elsa said kindly.

"Do you mind if I eat later, Elsa, I'm not hungry right now?" Abigail asked her aunt.

"Of course not, hon, I understand." Michael had told her what Marcus had said to her, and she was as disgusted with her nephew right now as the rest of them were. "I'll put a plate aside for you to make sure this husband of yours doesn't eat it all." She said with a sweet smile.

"But your cooking is just too good, Elsa." Ben smiled as he stood from the chair opposite Abigail.

"Come on, Ryan, hon." Elsa encouraged.

"I'm not hungry either." He told Elsa, wanting to stay with his sister and read, but Abigail shook her head.

"No, sweetie, you've got to eat your dinner. It's your favourite."

Ryan moaned. "Abi.."

"No buts." Abigail said, not a tone of harshness in her voice. "You need to eat to make you big and strong." She told him. Reluctantly, he climbed off the sofa and went into the kitchen with Elsa.

As she closed his book, Abigail watched Ben sitting on the arm of the chair and looking down on her. "Abigail," He said softly, making sure that no one but her could hear them, "You need to eat."

"I will do," She assured him with a weak smile, but as before, it wasn't convincing. "But I'm not hungry right now." As if on cue, her stomach growled, and Ben fixed her with a meaningful stare. "I can't stand to be around him right now, I'm going to lay down for a while. I'll eat later on."

With the promise of eating at some point, Ben nodded, and stood from the chair. Abigail went upstairs as her husband disappeared into the kitchen.

Ben sat down at the large kitchen table beside Michael, and opposite Ryan. Marcus looked at the empty seat at the 8-seater table, then around the room. "Where's Abigail?" He asked.

"Like you care." Michael growled quietly.

"Of course I care, she's my sister too!" Marcus said harshly.

"Maybe you should have remembered that earlier when you treated her like trash!" Michael pointed out.

Ben didn't trust himself to get involved in this arguement. What Marcus had said about Abigail's ability to raise children had quite possibly hurt him as much as it had hurt her. Had it been someone who wasn't related to her, he wouldn't have thought twice about hitting him hard enough to knock him out for a few hours, but seeing as it was her brother, regardless of whether or not she liked him at that moment in time, he held back his urges to cause him considerable pain.

"Boys!" Elsa scolded. It was the most order-like Ben had heard her speak so far. "Not at the table!" She ordered, which with her sideways glance at her youngest nephew, Ben knew meant 'not infront of Ryan'. Ben completely agreed with Michael though.

Ryan laughed through the mealtime as Ben taught him how to slurp up the spaghetti peices one strand at a time, which Elsa was glad for. Ben seemed to be helping the young boy a lot by playing with him and she smiled herself whenever she saw Ryan laughing away with his brother-in-law. Michael and Marcus seemed to be shooting daggers at each other the whole time. If looks could kill, there would have been a mass murder.

Having finished his own meal quickly, Ben saw the plate upon the stove being kept warm for Abigail. With a glance at Elsa, started to clear up his plate. "I'm going to make sure that Abigail gets her dinner, if that's alright." Elsa nodded.

"Of course, Ben, I know for a fact that she has no intention of eating today, and she had hardley anything all day." Elsa told him, which made Ben all the more determined to take her the plate. Taking a cup of water in his other hand, he left the room to go upstairs.

When he entered their bedroom, he found Abigail lying flat on her back on the bed with her eyes closed. He would have thought her to be asleep if her hand hadn't been rubbing small circles on her lower stomach. He set the glass down on the bedside table, but ran the plate of spaghetti bolognase close to her face. Her nose twitched as the aroma of her favourite meal floated around her, and she slowly opened one eye. "This had better not be a compromise to get me downstairs." She warned him.

"Not at all." He told her, and she pushed herself up on her elbows, her hand still lain over her stomach.

She didn't take the plate off him as he offered it out to her, complete with cutlery, but instead she looked up at him with a pleading look. "Ben, what Marcus said earlier...you don't think it's true, do you?" She asked him worriedly.

Ben looked at her lovingly and put the spaghetti aside so he could lean down and kiss her. It was a long kiss, and Abigail took a few moments to catch her breath afterwards. As she opened her eyes once again, she found Ben still looking at her with unconditional love for her. "I don't _think _it's not true, I _know _it's not true." He assured her.

"He didn't know about the one we lost.." She told him. "He doesn't even care..."

"I'm sure he cares." Ben assured her. "Don't worry, everything's going to work out fine. Don't listen to anything he said today."

"But-"

"No buts." He said, repeating her words from earlier. "You are going to look after Ryan wonderfully, and you will be the best mother in the world."

Though his words meant a lot to her, Marcus had got to her a lot more than she'd intended to let him; but then again, she hadn't counted on him saying what he had said. "Maybe it isn't all that simple though," She wondered aloud.

"Maybe not." Ben agreed. "But it doesn't change anything. Who are you going to trust? Him, or everyone else?"

"You," She said with a firm nod. "I trust you."

"Now, I risked letting your brother's kill each other to bring you this food, are you going to eat it or leave it to go cold?" He asked.

"OK, OK, I'll eat it." She surrendered, sitting up properly and taking the plate from Ben as he offered it to her again.

"And remember you can always have double now seeing as you're eating for two now." Ben reminded her.

"Double? You want me to give birth to something that will be the same size as me?" She asked daringly. "I hear that a normal sized baby is painful enough."

"Good point." Ben said after some thought.

Abigail started eating, but after a few mouthfuls she stopped. Ben was lying back on the bed relaxing beside her. "So are Michael and Marcus still..."

"Trying to kill each other? Yeah." Ben said.

"Looks like tomorrow will be fun." Abigail said sarcastically. "I think Elsa said something about Aunt Marion coming round as well."

"Which one is Marion again?" Ben asked, not able to remember all of her aunts off the top of his head. Both her parents had had a lot of siblings, which in some ways was good, but in others was bad; particularly when they were talking to you for half an hour about something that they presumed you knew about.

"The one who doesn't like me." Abigail reminded. Oh yes, Ben remembered her, she hadn't thought very much of him either. The words _imbecile, _along with _traitor to the country _had been overheard in a few conversations at their wedding, along with _desperate _a few times in mention to Abigail. He supposed he wasn't very fond of her either, but he had smiled forcedly when he was introduced by Abigail's father to his eldest sister. "She did have a reason for it, but she should have go over it by now."

"Abigail, you spilt red wine over her white carpet," He pointed out.

"I was three!" She said defensively.

"And bent her ornamental spoons!"

"What sort of stupid person collects _spoons?" _

"And the cat?"

"The cat..." She tried to find a word suitable to describe what had happened to Marion's cat. "...was Michael's fault."

"Even though it was you who chased it out of the house?"

"Yes."

"And over the wall?"

"Yes."

"And straight under the wheel of a car?"

She feigned a hurt look. "Who's side are you on?" She asked accusingly.

"Yours as always, my love." He told her convincingly.

She gave up on dinner about half way through the plateful. Ben gave her a look as if to question it, "Me and the baby are full." She told him. "Remember, the baby's only small still."

"Yeah, our tiny baby." Ben said, filled with awe. He rubbed her stomach again. "I think I'm going to become addicted to this." He told her.

"Well, I'm not complaining." She replied, putting the plate aside, and lying down beside Ben. "Is it too early to say I'm going to sleep?" She asked, closing her eyes.

"Its 5pm. Way too early." He told her.

She sighed. "I don't care." She moaned. "I don't want to be around any one else but you for the rest of the day." She announced, and Ben drew her into his arms.

"Funny, seems like we've both got the same plan."


	9. River Runs Dry

The day of Amanda and James's funeral finally arrived. Abigail spent most of the morning getting Ryan ready, and herself. She was wearing a black knee length dress with spaghetti straps and a black cardigan of her mothers over the top. Ryan she had dressed in a long sleeve black shirt with his smartest jeans. He didn't have any black trousers, but she wasn't in the mood to go shopping for more. Looking in the mirror, she sighed. Her hair was curled up into a tight bun, but after a few moments of looking at her relfection, she pulled the pins holding it together out and let it fall down past her shoulders.

"Honey, you look fine." Ben said, coming up behind her and putting his arms around her waist.

"It's not that," She whispered. "I looked like my mother with my hair up like that, it...it freaked me out a little bit for a moment." She admitted.

"Don't worry," He whispered to her reassuringly. "It's going to be fine." He hugged her close, but pulled away rather shocked.

"What is it?" She asked.

"I don't believe it." He said, quite distantly.

"Ben?" She started to get quite worried.

"This is unbelievable."

"Ben, you're scaring me!" She said quietly, "What is it?"

"You gotta see this!"

"See what?"

He took hold of her shoulders and turned her sideways. He then stood behind her again, but this time, his hands rested either side of her stomach. "Look." Ben told her. Still confused, she looked, but saw nothing.

He took her hand in his and placed it at the top of her stomach. "You don't feel anything, right?" He asked. She shook her head. "How about now?" He guided her hand slowly down her stomach. "You feel anything?"

This time she felt it. She felt her skin rising and then falling again as he trailed their hands down her stomach. "Oh my god." She breathed. It was a wonderful feeling, it filled every inch of her with a warmth she had never experienced before. She smiled, unable to do anything else. Bens hand moved from resting atop hers so their hands were now side by side. "This is...amazing." She said breathlessly. No other words would bring themselves forward at the moment.

"This just makes it seem so real." Ben said, completely struck by the bump they could feel. It was small, very small, unnoticeable unless you knew to look for it, but it was still there.

"Ben." Abigail whispered. "Thank you. Thank you for giving me this." She said, as her thumb rubbed her stomach.

"You are very very welcome," He replied.

They were interrupted by a knock on the door, followed by Michael's quiet voice. "Abs, it's time to go. Are you ready?"

"Yes. We'll be down in a moment."

Abigail sighed. "I can't do this." She said shakily. The whole week she had wanted to get the day over with, to pay her respects to her parents and let them lie in peace, together. Now the day had arrived, she didn't want it to happen. She turned to face Ben. "I can't go through with this, Ben, I can't." She said, suddenly panicked.

He placed his hands on her upper arms. "Yes, you can Abi, you can do this." He told her.

"I don't want to do this. Why did this have to happen?"

"I know it hurts, Abi, I know it does. But we can't change what's happened. If we could, we would, but we can't." Ben explained. "Remember, you aren't on your own today. You have Michael, and as much as you don't like the idea, you have Marcus. And you have me as well, and anything you want me to do for you, anything at all, I want you to tell me, all right?"

She nodded and mumbled something that he couldn't understand. He embraced her, and then kissed the top of her head before they left the room together.

Ryan was back to being quiet and distant again today. In the car on the way to the church, he sat on Abigail's lap, refusing to sit anywhere else. No one argued with him, though, and Abigail welcomed her brother into her embrace. Abigail, Ryan and Ben sat in the back of Elsa and Danny's car, with Michael and Danny upfront. Elsa had gone with Marcus in his car. Halfway through the journey though, Ryan started sniffing the air eagerly.

"Ryan?" Abigail asked uncertainly. He leaned against Abigail, and sniffed the shoulder of her cardigan, before curling against her even more, holding his face against her cardigan.

"It's you." He whispered.

"Ryan, what are you talking about sweetie? What's me?" She asked him.

"You smell like Mommy." He whispered gently.

Of course, it was their mothers old cardigan, and one she wore a lot at that. No doubt that Ryan obviously associated the smell of the cardigan with their mother. She didn't say anything, she only continued to hug him tightly. She suddenly wished that she was five years old, and that she had someone bigger than her, someone wiser, to protect her, to fight off the pain. _You already have that someone. _Her mind told her, a comforting voice that reminded her of her mother's words. _You have Ben. _She looked at her husband, who was looking at her, almost sending strength through his gaze.

Arriving at the church, Abigail was greeted by people she had not seen in ages. Old friends, relatives, everyone that was even remotely linked to their parents were all gathered under one roof. She had all the classic lines.

"My, haven't you grown! I haven't seen you since you were ten!"

"I am so sorry for your loss, dearie."

"It's really wonderful what you're doing for your brother."

"Do you still swim? I remember you being quite a swimmer."

"Oh, you poor darling."

"If there's anything I can do, don't hesitate to ask me."

"We're just a phonecall away."

Within five minutes she already wanted to run back to the house and lock herself away, but she kept her head up high, and tried to be strong. She had built herself up to this for over a week now, but it was nothing she could have expected. Nothing at all. After all, what could she do? She was about to bury her parents. Seeing as she wasn't strong enough to hold Ryan like he wanted her to, the young boy latched himself around Michael's neck, not saying anything to anyone. Stepping into the church, Abigail was reminded of her grandfather's funeral when she was ten. Spotting her lonely grandmother, looking distraught in the front row, she took her seat beside her, Ryan taking his place in her lap again.

"Does it ever get any easier?" Abigail asked her grandmother.

"No," She whispered back. "The pain heals, but it's always there."

Abigail sighed. "I know this is all very bad for us, but it doesn't seem like anyone has come to ask you how you're feeling." Abigail commented, taking her aging grandmothers hand. "It wasn't so long ago that you were burying your husband, and now you're burying your daughter."

She could see the tears glistening in her grandmothers eyes. She tightened her grip on Abigail's hand as Michael sat beside her and Ben sat beside Abigail. "I still have you." She said hopefully. "You're so much like my Amanda."

Abigail shook her head. "Mom was wonderful. She was so much more than me."

"You're more like her than you think. Attractive? You light up a room when you walk into it. Caring? I've never seen you put your own problems before any one elses. Loving? You're doing a wonderful thing for your brother." Abigail sighed. "Don't worry, sweetheart, things will work out." Her grandmother assured, then she smiled softly. "You know, Emma is back from Egypt. She moved out there not too long ago with little Evy. She should be here somewhere."

Abigail nodded. Emma, her cousin, was the only other girl besides Abigail in their generation. They were so close when they were young that they could have been twins if it wasn't for the fact that Abigail was three years older. Music started playing, and Abigail swallowed the lump in her throat.


	10. Gotta Have A Reason

**Ok, major apologies that I haven't updated for so long, but I'm done with school now so I will update more. I just had a bit of writers block with the end of this chapter, but I remembered a conversation about 2 children and lollypops with Toxic-Beetle and had to include it :D  
Sam  
xx**

The hardest part of the service wasn't knowing that her parents were in the coffins at the front of the church, it was Michael's speech. He had asked to do the speech, and their grandmother was going to do one as well, but Abigail didn't want to. She knew that she would cry as soon as she got up there, and she didn't want to leave Ryan. Eventually, though, the time came to say her goodbyes. She didn't exactly cry, but she had a lot of tears running down her face. One tear fell onto her father's cheek, and she wondered, if like it happened in fairy tales, that he would magically wake up, give her that reassuring smile and hug her, but he didn't. She couldn't remember what she had said, exactly, but she remembered mentioning that she would never really say goodbye to them, and of course, that she loved them. She stayed with Ryan while he said goodbye, which throughout she fought against the lump in her throat terribly.

"I miss you both. I want you to come home, but people say you can't. You don't look dead, you look asleep. Are you really tired? We'll see each other again, soon, right? Michael says I will see you one day, when I am much older, but I want to see you now." He sniffed, trying to be brave and wiped his face on the sleeve of his jacket. "Don't worry, Mommy and Daddy, Abi and Ben are going to look after me. They're going to look after me really good. I know they will. So don't worry. I love you lots."

The wake was held at a hired hall not too far from Elsa's house, within walking distance easily. There, Abigail quickly managed to escape the amount of people there to find somewhere quiet. Unlike the others, she didn't find the nearest glass of alcohol and down it, she knew better than that, plus, she was pregnant, she couldn't drink as it was dangerous, and she wasn't making any mistakes this time. Michael and Marcus had disappeared somewhere, no doubt to make up with one another and be civilised. Ryan, instead, was clinging to Ben's neck now, giving Abigail's arms a break. He had hidden his face in his shoulder, which reminded Ben a lot of Abigail the other night.

"Ben, I'm going to go get some fresh air." She explained.

"Ok, you want me to come with you?" He offered.

She shook her head, "No, that's fine, you stay here with Ryan, I'll be all right."

She walked away, feeling bad about shutting him out, as she had primised not to do, but she needed to escape and be on her own for a while. She found the exit to the hall beside the bar, which led outside. There were stands there which overlooked a soccer pitch. She remembered when she was younger, coming to watch Michael play soccer here with his friends. A few times, she had protested, begging her parents to let her stay home alone, but they had insisted that she come and support her brother; after all, he went to all her swimming competitions.

She walked over to the stands, walking halfway up them and taking a seat randomly along the raised bench. Looking out onto the pitch, she could almost see the boys running around, shouting to each other on the pitch. She didn't know how long she sat there for, but she guessed it at about half an hour before she heard music coming from inside the hall. No sooner had the music begun, she heard a little girls laugh echoing around her. She looked around, but couldn't see anyone.

"Looking for us?"

She looked to her side and saw someone with a starkling resemblance to herself sit down beside her, holding two cups. She handed one to Abigail. "It's water. Don't worry." She assured her. Taking the cup slowly, Abigail raised it to her lips and took a sip, just out of politeness, not because she was thirsty.

The owner of the laugh came forward, in the form of a two year old girl with dark hair and dark eyes, much unlike her mothers.

"I was wondering when I'd see you." Emma said to Abigail. This was Abigail's supposed twin. Of all the people to come find her outside, she was glad it was Emma, who wouldn't pity her or drown her with sympathy.

"I didn't know you were going out to Egypt." Abigail said. "How long ago?"

"Six months now. Got a place right near Johnny's work." Johnny, Emma's husband, worked over in a museum. After he had worked there for two months, it became too much for Emma to be seperated from him, especially when she had Evy to consider, who also had missed her father. "It's strange, being in a new place and away from the people I grew up with, but being a proper family is nice." She turned to Abigail fully. "So, when's it due?"

Abigail choked on the mouthful of water she had just taken, and turned her head to Emma. The girl certainly had a way of taking her mind off of things. "Excuse me?" She asked. How did she know? Did Ben tell her? He was the only other person besides herself who knew. Was it just a lucky guess? A conversation maker?

"I'm a mother myself, Abi." Emma reminded her. "Even with all this going on in your life right now, I can see that look in your eyes." She said softly, and motioned down at her stomach, "And that ever so small bump you have there."

Her plan of not telling any one until they had to was going steadily down the drain. "Emma-"

"Don't worry, no one else has noticed. And I'm not going to tell anyone." She winked.

Abigail nodded. "Thanks."

"I hear Marcus put his foot in it a bit." Emma mentioned.

"I see you still have your habit of picking up every bit of information which comes your way?" Abigail teased in reply. She was glad that Emma was with her, it lifted her spirits somewhat.

"Has he apologized?" Emma asked, ignoring Abigail's question.

"No." Abigail said stubbornly. "I don't care what he has to say anymore."

"You should." Emma corrected quietly.

"Why?" Abigail said desperately. "Why should I have to put up with his anger all the time?"

"Because he's your brother." Emma said softly, putting her arm about Abigail, who was thankful for her small gesture. "And even though it might not seem that way all the time, he loves you." Abigail sighed, putting her head in her hands for a moment. "Abi, you buried your parents today. You need each other as a family. I overheard him talking to Johnny, he said that he never would have said it if he knew that you had miscarried. He isn't a monster." She told him.

"Yes, he is." She said stubbornly.

"When you were born, who taught you how to walk?" Emma said. "Who brought you sweets home when he went to the movies with his friends?"

Abigail sat silently, remembering what Emma was saying. Marcus hadn't always been bad to her. He had been quite a good brother at times. "He did." She answered after her moment of silence.

"What he said was wrong, but that shouldn't matter today. Today, he needs his sister."

"He doesn't need me."She said, almost wishing that what Emma was saying was true.

"He does." She confirmed. "Your the only reminder he has now of Amanda. The closest thing he has left. He doesn't need you to shut him away. He wants to change, Abigail."

"I don't know-" She began, but trailed off. Emma tried a different approach.

"What will you tell your baby when they grow up and ask about him. Will you say that he lives far away and visits whenever he can, or will you tell them that you haven't spoken to him because he thinks you'd be a bad mother?"

It put everything in a new perspective. When she said it that way, it seemed like another one of their small tiffs, even though it was on a tender subject for Abigail. Underneath all her hatred for him, she still wanted to be a good sister, as she had all the time, and that was usually what got her into trouble with him. "You're right." Abigail said weakly."God, what's happening here? I've messed everything up." She said helplessly.

"No you haven't, you just don't know how to react. No one does in this situation." Emma assured. "Nothing could have prepared you for this. It was a shock to everyone, especially you and your brothers."

Evy came wandering up to Abigail. "Aunty Abi," She said sweetly, even though Abi wasn't really her Aunt, "Where's Ryan?" it was sometimes amusing how Evy treated Abigail as an Aunt, but Ryan as a cousin or brother.

"He's inside with Ben, honey. Do you remember Ben?" Abigail asked.

"Treasure man?" She asked.

"Yes, Evy, the treasure man."

Evy was about to skip off when Emma stopped her. "Wait a sec, sweetie." She said, Evy stopped and looked.

"Yes, Mommy?"

Emmapulled two red lollypops out of her pocket. "One for you and one for Ryan." She said. "Remember to hold the stick and don't run!"She reminded.

"Ok Mommy."

Evy found Ryan sitting with Ben near the bar with Michael. He went off to play with Evy when she gave him his red lollypop, and Michael and Ben smiled, glad that Ryan was no longer hanging onto one of them desperately. They were soon running around together, even Ryan was laughing as they did so. Ben heard the ringing of a cellphone, and Michael shrugged. "Not mine."

Pulling his from his pocket, he saw the name 'Riley' on the caller i.d. Sighing, he opened the phone and answered it.

"Riley?" He asked.

"Ben, we've got a problem." Riley said hesistantly.

**DUN DUN DUN!**


	11. Hearts Breaking Even

**First of all, I'd like to apologize for not updating for so long. I've had major writers block, and this chapter actually came to me when I woke up this morning, so if it's bad, it's because I was half asleep. So my thank you's for not only reviewing but also giving me the kick up the butt to write another chapter go to:**

**Elentari Undomiel  
Bryanne  
SilentTrain Conductor  
CharlieLOVER  
Moonlit Rainbow  
Melcarisa  
Claire  
Roxxy9  
Electric-dreamer  
Jedi Mase  
Toxic-Beetle  
Idinakristinfan  
Otaku Sarri  
Danielle515  
Jinna  
Elvenrarehunter**

**  
I have some serious writers block at the moment, so I'm sorry if there isn't another chapter this week. Its the start of the school holidays now and I have to share the PC with my brother because my one in my room is broken :(  
****Sam  
xx  
**

Hearing Riley's voice on the other side of the phone was something of a comfort at first, but as soon as the word 'We've got a problem' escaped his lips, Ben knew exactly what had happened.

"What sort of problem?" He asked, desperate to know he was wrong.

"Well, uh, I just got home, and my computer's gone."

Ben felt like whaking his head against the bar. "You rang me at a funeral to tell me that your computer's gone?" He asked calmly.

"No, Ben, it's not gone. It's _gone. _My study has been trashed and there's a load of things missing."

Ok, so maybe he wasn't wrong.

"What?"

"I checked yours and Abigail's study as well, it's trashed, but as far as I can see, nothing is gone."

Ben put his arm tensely on the bar top to stop himself hitting his head on the dark wood.

"Are you telling me that someone broke into our house, trashed the place, and stole your whole computer?" He asked one final time, unable to believe what was happening. Beside him, having heard what was Riley's reason of calling, Michael raised his eyebrows, silently wondering how they could have taken his computer and him only just realising that someone had broken in.

"No, I'm telling you that Ian did it." Riley said in a matter-of-factly tone.

"Why would he take your computer and no one elses?" Ben asked.

The reply came in a form of uncoherant mumbles in which Ben made out a few phrases, 'Egyptian', 'Necklace' and 'Treasure'.

"Riley!" Ben said warningly. "Today is not a good day for me, just tell me properly!"

"I was following up a legend on an Egyptian necklace." He admitted, defeated. "Things have been kind of slow recently, nothing's been happening, so I thought that a good old treasure hunt was a sure way to make some action around here."

"Well, is this enough action for you?" Ben asked. He wasn't happy already when Riley had rang him, because of Abigail, but having Ian steal things for a treasure hunt from his house had just taken his mood from 'Angry' to 'Homocidal'. Remembering that this was Riley, the timid computer freak, on the phone, he forced himself to calm down. "Me and Abigail are flying back in two days time. We'll sort it out then." He said.

"How is she?" Riley asked, his tone changing completely.

"Not good, she's trying to shut it all away, and one of her brother's is being a jerk. Ryan's coming back with us though." He told Riley.

"Ryan? Abi's little brother?"

"Yeah, she's the only one who can look after him without the social services getting involved, so we're taking him in." Ben told him.

"That's real good of you both." Riley said.

"They need each other, and I'm not about to let the kid get taken away from his family when there's a perfectly good home waiting for him."

"Nice plan." Riley said.

Ben felt a tugging on his leg, and found himself looking at a small dark haired girl standing beside Ryan. Evy and Ryan had obviously had enough of playing now. "Riley, I've gotta go, I'll call you tomorrow." He said. As he closed his phone, he could faintly hear Riley calling: 'Ben, wait!' But ignored it. He turned to the two kids. "Hey," He said, "What's the matter?" He asked, looking at Evy's determined little face, which was sprouting the remains of the red lollypop.

"My Mommy wants you outside." Evy said, pulling on Ben's hand now.

Following the kids outside, Ben went to where Emma sat on the stands. "Hi Emma." He said. "You all right?"

"Me? Fine." She said airily.

"What did you need me for?" Ben asked.

Emma pointed out over to a corner of the soccer pitch below them where Abigail was siting talking to her eldest brother, Marcus. "In case _that_ doesn't go too well." Emma said.

* * *

When Emma had suggested that Abigail talk to Marcus, she hadn't liked the idea at first, but she knew that her friend was right. Emma was always right about everything, always had been, and always would be, and her advice was unmatched worldwide. So when Marcus had stepped outside to get some air, she had announced that she was going to talk to him, but had stubbornly assured Emma that she was not going to apologize. To get away from everyone else, they went and stood in the corner of the soccer pitch, barely speaking on their walk over there. Even when they sat down on a bench, there was a gap between them that might have indicated they were enemies rather than siblings. Abigail was the first to speak, her stubborness outmatched by anyone except the brother that had taught it to her.

"What are we doing, Marcus?" She asked. "Why are we being like this today?"

Marcus was silent at first, his dark hair seeming pitch black in the approaching darkness. "It's not the best day in the world, is it?" He commented.

"I've lived better days." She agreed, "But this isn't the first time I've felt that it's been the worst day of my life." She was reffering, of course, to her miscarriage, but to say the 'M' word was one that she couldn't do. She had a hard enough time saying that she lost a baby, but to call it a miscarriage she felt was a betrayal to her lost child.

More silence, but eventually, Marcus spoke. "Why didn't you tell me?" He asked her.

"You never called, and when I left messages, you never called back. You never visited. It felt like you didn't care about us anymore." She said softly. "I didn't think you'd want to know."

"I would have been there in a heartbeat, Abigail." He told her strongly, so strongly in fact that she found herself beleiving it. "You're my sister."

"It didn't always feel like it." She reminded him. "I always felt like a disappointment to you, because you always found something to critisize." She took a shaky breath, which he didn't notice. "Even my ability to be a good mother."

Marcus sighed heavily and slowly, and she could sense the regret in his release of breath. "You shouldn't have to be Ryan's mother." Marcus said.

"I don't want to be his mother." She said stubbornly. "I'd never try to replace Mom. I don't intend to be his mother, I just want to be his sister."

"Can't you be his sister in California?" Marcus asked quietly.

"Can't you be his brother in Canada?" She retorted quickly, before she could stop herself saying it. "Why did you say all those things?" She asked, not having to explain which things she meant.

He thought for a moment, clearly trying to figure that out himself. "Miracles can't happen, Abigail. There is no Happy Ever After in this life."

"What if they could?" She asked.

"If they could then we's still have our parents." He said. "Life is not a Disney Movie." He always mocked the fact that Abigail, as a child, wanted to grow up to live Happily Ever After with her prince like the princesses in the Disney films she loved to watch and sing along to so much.

"There are only two Disney films where the character has both of their parents." She pointed out, "And they all lived well."

"You think Ben can be your prince?" Marcus asked with a laugh.

Abigal felt her anger boiling inside of her, but instead of yelling, she just nodded. "Yeah, I do."

"Life isn't a movie." He repeated. "There are no adventures."

"Adventures?" She asked. "You mean a Prince in disguise? Treasure maps? Buried treasure?" She knew that all of this was true. After all, Ben, at first, had told her his name was Paul Brown, hence becoming the 'prince in disguise'. Then the adventure, that Marcus seemed too keen to dismiss, had a treasure map which led them too an underground treasure hold. Adventures were real - you just had to find them.

"Abigail-"

She couldn't take it anymore. She stood up and took a few steps forward, but then turned back to her brother.

"Just so you know, Marcus, miracles can happen." She said awkwardly, pulling her mother's cardigan closer around her as a gust of wind sent her hair rippling across her shoulders. "After all, isn't that the only reason I'd be pregnant?"


	12. New Starts

**I know, I know, I know. It's been ages since I've updated, but this week and next week should be good becuase I want to get right into the action by Xmas. So to make sure I do, I've done a proper plan (not just a short crappy one like I'd done before), including the script for it. So unless I get to a strange bit, I've got no excuse for writers block. Here's to Toxic-Beetle, just like last time, for poking me with a stick to get me to update, so thank her for making me do it!**

**Sam**

**xx**

Stepping back into their driveway was somewhat of a release for Abigail, who was glad to be home. Her large house seemed more prestigious than usual from spending over a week in smaller housing again. Ryan, who stood beside her clutching his Egyptian book that he had been reading in the car (how he didn't get carsick she didn't know), looked up at it with amazement.

"Home sweet home." Ben said, hugging Abigail from behind before starting to take their luggage up to the house. Michael hurried along beside him, awfilled.

"Seriously, you guys live here?" He asked, looking around him like he was inside a TV programme.

"Yeah."

"Whoa." He replied, then snapped back in what could be called a 'normal' state of mind for Michael and carried on walking as if this were completely regular for him. "Nice place."

Shaking his head sympathecially at Michael while silently laughing at his strange antics that reminded him so much of Riley, Ben grinned. "Thanks."

Abigail took Ryan's bag, and started to follow the others, beckoning to her younger brother to follow her. "Is this my home now?" He asked her.

Abigail looked at him with a smile that for once, she didn't have to drag to her face. "Yes, sweetie."

"With you?"

She nodded. "Just like we said on the plane. We'll live together now."

"So I can see you everday?" He checked, his head tilting to one side in a cute way.

"Of course." She said, and he smiled, running ahead to catch up to Ben and Michael. Abigail was only a few steps behind him as the door of their house swung open and Riley emerged.

"Ben! Abi! You're back early." He said, as if he had simply opened the door and not expected to see them there, but Riley always seemed constantly confused unless he was talking about things that the others didn't seem to understand.

"We managed to get onto an earlier flight." Ben explained.

Riley turned to hug Abigail. "You Ok?" He asked her.

She hugged him back and then parted with the smallest of smiles, but still convincing. "I'm Ok." She assured him.

"Good to hear."

"Riley, this is my brother Michael." She explained, and the two men shook hands.

"The infamous Riley Poole." Michael smirked.

"The not-so-infamous Michael Chase." Riley countered, then turned to the boy tugging on his trouser leg. "And Ryan - Little man, good to see you again pal. I don't think you remember me do you?" He checked.

Ryan nodded, to his surprise. "You gave me money at Abi's wedding." He remembered.

The others laughed, but Riley patted Ryan on the head. "Yes, I did. But I was very drunk that night."

"I know." Ryan said, dismissing it evenly. "You danced funny. Abi said that you had drunk enough to fill a swimming pool."

"Did she now?" Riley asked, raising an eyebrow at Abigail who looked away innocently.

"Riley dances like that all the time, Ryan." Ben told him, and the boy laughed. "Now come on, kiddo, let's go find your new bedroom."

* * *

Ben came downstairs about twenty minutes later with Ryan, who rushed straight away to the PlayStation that Riley had set up for him. Ben went into the kitchen were the others were drinking coffee, trying to wake up from the overnight flight without throwing off their sleep pattern. Abigail handed him a cup as he sat down beside her.

"I managed to clear things up before you guys got back." Riley explained timidly.

Abigail smirked. "From all the girls you had here when we were gone?" She asked.

Riley frowned at her strangely, as if trying to figure out which illegal mediaction she was on. "No, from when Ian was here."

She nearly dropped her mug. "_What!"_ She exclaimed.

"Riley, you don't know for sure that it was him." Ben doubled up, not wanting Abigail to worry about Ian being able to get into their house.

"Ian was here? In our house?" She asked.

"It was him, Ben." Riley said surely. Ignoring Abigail's question.

"No, you don't know that." He pointed out again.

"Who else would it be?" Riley asked dramatically. "Who else would break into _your _house and steal information for a treasure hunt?"

That hit the nail on the head. Abigail's head snapped quickly between Riley's and Ben's looking for an explanation. "Treasure hunt? What treasure hunt?"

Ben sighed. "Riley..."

Riley cut him off, however. "Ben, have you not been in your study? The place is trashed!"

Abigail looked between the two men and then at her brother, who looked as clueless as she did. "Does anyone want to tell me what in God's name is going on?" She asked tiredly.

Ben threw a glare at Riley before explaining the situation without meeting anyone's gaze. "Riley was chasing up a lost treasure."

"And Ian found out." Riley continued. "My whole computer was taken, and our studies were trashed."

Abigail sighed, putting her head in her hands for a moment, before running her fingers through her hair and lifting her head again to look at Riley. "What else was taken?" She asked in a hollow tone.

"All of my Egyptian history books that I had notes in." He explained.

"What kind of notes?" Ben asked.

"Notes of where it might be." He said obviously.

"Where _what _might be?" Ben and Abigail asked together.

Riley looked dumbfounded for a moment, then remembered that he hadn't told him what he had been looking for and quickly explained. "The Necklace of Isis." He said.

"Isis?"

"She was an Egyptian goddess, Ben."

Ben rolled his eyes. "I know who Isis was, thank you, Riley."

"Wait a second," Abigail said, holding up a hand and looking at Riley with keen interest. "...You found it?"

"You know it?" He asked in a slightly high-pitched, amazed voice.

"Have you found it?" She repeated clearly.

"Do you know it?"

"Riley!"

"I might have done. Do you know about the Necklace?" He asked her.

She nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I know it."

Ben looked at his wife with a frown, as did Michael. "Abi, how?" Riley asked.

Abigail was silent, not knowing how to explain, but it was Michael who came forward and explained. "She's always known about it." He told them. "Since before she could talk."

"That's impossible." Riley scoffed, "She can't have known about it her whole life."

"Why not?" Ben asked. "If someone told her the story and she remembered it-"

"No one knows the story, Ben." Riley confirmed. "The only ones who did know were the ones associated with it in some way or form. Last I checked, Abi wasn't three thousand years old."

"Five." Abigail said.

"What?" Riley asked.

"The Necklace would be five thousand years old, not three." She corrected.

"See." Ben said, backing Abigail up.

"Ben. It's impossible." Riley tried to reason.

"Well if it's so impossible how did you find out about it?" Michael asked.

"Because I found the legend." Riley said proudly.

"You have the Isis Reforms?" Abigail asked astounded.

Again, Riley looked at her like she was insane. "How the hell did you know it was called that?"

"Do you have it or not?" Ben asked.

Riley nodded. "It's the one thing Ian didn't take."

"Where is it?" He asked.

Riley nodded upstairs. "In my safe. C'mon, I'll show you."

A/N: So, for lack of updates, I'm getting straight to the action now. Characters have been brought in, time for the adventure :D What do you think so far?


	13. Final Apocalypse

They went upstairs to Riley's office. Ryan was still happily playing on the PlayStation, going through all of Riley's games without a care in the world, so Abigail, Riley, Ben and Michael went into the office, leaving the door open in case Ryan called for them. Riley had managed to clear most of the wreck of his office up just enough so that it looked as messy as it usually did. The only flaw in this, however, was that the remainder of the photo frames and the ornaments had been broken or smashed.

He went straight over to the safe in the wall, which Ian hadn't been able to get into. "An associate of mine got hold of it at a museam, asked me if I was interested in trying to find it for him." He babbled, while enterting the combination.

"So, the Reforms, are they directions?" Ben asked.

"Kind of." Riley vaugely answered. Just like him, never give a certain answer if there was a uncertain one at hand.

"They were a way of luring adventurers off its course, to warn them away from it." Abigail told him. "Different verses of it were found along the path, giving details about it along the way to put them off, to scare them."

Ben gave her a strange look, but she didn't notice it.

"One Pharaoh went after it though, and recorded every verse, sending each one back to his advisor back in the city to have them documented." Riley carried on, opening the safe and now sorting through the peices of paper and money he had randomly thrown in there.

"What happened?" Ben asked, knowing that something had gone wrong.

"When he found the location, he went back with five hundred men. Again, only his advisor knew that he had left."

"And no one ever saw them again." Ben deduced.

"Exactly."

"Where are they then?" Abigail asked, and Riley pulled them out of the safe.

"Here."

It was a scrap of papyrus, worthless in many eyes, but to the three pairs of trained eyes, it was priceless. Abigail felt a strange pull to it, and reached out to hold it. As soon as her fingertips touched it, she withdrew them sharply, an invisible pain causing her to drop it. Ben focused on her immediately.

"Are you all right?" He asked her.

She nodded. "Yeah..."

"What happened?"

"Just...nothing. Nothing." She knew better than to play the nothing game with him, but even though he knew she was lying, he let it go, knowing that she wouldn't say anything at the moment with Riley and Michael in the room.

Riley handed the document to Ben instead, who felt nothing when he touched it. He stared at it for the moment.

"What does it say?" He asked, and Riley jumped a little at the question, forgetting that Ben wasn't able to read heiroglyphs. However, having seen Abigail's reaction to touching the paper, he had an idea.

"Abi, you can read Egyptian." He prompted, nodding at the document.

She nodded, and stepped closer to Ben. He handed her the Reforms, and she took them, the sharp pain no longer present, just replaced with a strange sensation like a dull electric current running through her.

_"In the depths of darkest Sahara,  
Underneath the blanket dunes  
There's a wonderous hidden treasure  
Under watch of it's tribunes.  
They stand watch for ancient lore  
That commands their constant stand  
For traditions now unheard of  
In this world of forgotten lands.  
Their sacred duty holds strong  
When others would surely fail  
And the so they stand united  
__On the long untrodden trail.  
__As beneath the star-crossed sky  
__With the moon in risen glory,  
__A legend once unfolded hence  
__A most amazing story.  
__A goddess with amazing ways  
__Of changing women's luck.  
__Yet anger her if you shall dare  
__And devestation will be struck.  
__For she has a secret trinket  
__From which she draws this ancient spell.  
__It gives rise to amazing magic  
__That even a wand could not expel.  
__This mysterious, alluring charm  
__Comes not from carven stylus,  
__But instead this power lies waiting  
__In the form of a golden necklace.  
__Inside this golden wonder  
__Lies a power unimaginable  
__With ability to bring to life  
__The worst parts of the bible.  
__It grants its wearer its magic  
__And they become undefeatably strong.  
__Yet along with immortality,  
__Comes the temptation to stray to wrong.  
__Men have trailed to search it  
__But return only with bloodstains.  
__It's hidden for a reason,  
__And it cannot be contained.  
__But it was put away from human life  
__Because of all it's power.  
__And the day that it has been wrought by Man  
__Will become Man's darkest hour.  
__If the goddess couldn't sand it's hold  
__Then what can Man hope to do?  
__For if a spirit being has no hope,  
__Neither does Man, it's true.  
__So before you pack your travels  
__And plan your expedition,  
__Be prepared to agree to this,  
__A last prepared condition:  
__Keep your wits about you,  
__It's protectors will not stray,  
__They'll keep defending the necklace  
__Until their dying day.  
__Beware of ancient devils  
__That live amongst the sands,  
__There's more than human dangers  
__In this undetering lands.  
__But the biggest trouble awaits you  
__When the sun begins to set  
__And the curses that protect your prize  
__Are the most terrible of threats.  
__So go ahead and seek it  
__If you think you're the right Man,  
__That's different than the others,  
__That never turned and ran.  
__But as soon as your hands falter,  
__And from your grasp it slips  
__It is at your hands that Man will suffer  
__The final apocalypse."_

Abigail immediately thrust the paper back into Ben's hands and stepped backwards, sitting down on Riley's desk chair.

Ben looked at it again. "That's quite a warning, alright." He commented, then turned to Riley. "Are you sure it's a good idea to go after this thing?"

Riley looked at him with intense seriousness. "Now that Ian knows, do you really think we have a choice?"

Ben shook his head slightly "This is talking about the end of the world, Riley."

"In the wrong hands." His friend added.

"What makes ours so right?" He asked.

"Maybe they're not." Riley shrugged. "We have to find the right hands.

"And let this be released into the world?"

"Surely it'll be safe in a museum." Michael suggested.

"Technically, No." Riley started, and Ben picked up his thinking.

"If people know about it's supposed power then it will be impossible to stop them from studying it, trying to see how it would work. It would have more luck on the Black Market." Ben told him.

Michael raised his eyebrows. "Ok, maybe not." He backtracked.

Riley turned back to Ben. "Ian knows, Ben. He knows that it could do, what its capable of."

"We don't know what it's capable of." Ben pointed out. "We just know what the warning tells us. It might still be a myth."

Riley stared at him with disappointment, which turned straight away into determination. "I'm sorry, but I refuse to believe that."

Before Ben could comment any further, Abigail spoke up from in the corner.

"Ben, he's right."

He turned to her with a look of surprise. "What? Abi-"

"We can't let Ian get to this before us. It's too dangerous." She said to him.

"It's too dangerous for us to go after it." Ben said, attempting to put his foot down.

"Yes, it's dangerous." Abigail agreed. "But at least as can make sure that Ian doesn't destroy the world."

Ben was silent for a minute thinking things over, and then ran his hands over his face and through his hair. "I don't know." He admitted. "I don't want you in this sort of danger." He said to her softly. It was more than her to think about as well, there was the child that they were so desperate not to lose.

"She doesn't have a choice, Ben." Michael said just as quietly. They all turned to look at him.

"What?" Ben and Riley said in unison.

"She has to do this." He repeated.

"Anyone can do, why does it have to be her?" Ben asked.

"Because she's the only one who can find it."

Abigail looked up at Michael, and he continued.

"On her first day of school, she was looking at a map. I was in the same school, and me and Mom had taken her to her class first to get her settled in Ok. She was looking at this map of the world, and her teacher came over. Abi asked her where Egypt was. The teacher showed her, and asked why she wanted to know, and Abs told her why. "that's where the necklace is." she said to her. "that's where i've got to go." ".

Abigail frowned a little. "I don't remember that." She said slowly.

"I don't suppose you would, you were only Ryan's age." He pointed out. "You won't remember that one of your first two syllable words was 'necklace' yet you and Mom never wore any jewellery."

"Wait a second," Ben stopped him. "What does that mean, exactly?"

"It means that she knows where it is." Riley said.

"How could I possible know something like that?" Abigail said with a weak laugh.

"When you touched the Reforms, you felt something, didnt you?" Abigail was silent, avoiding everyones eyes. Riley stepped closer. "Didn't you?"

Abigail stood up. "I'm sorry, I guess I've got jetlag or something, I need to go and lie down for a bit." She said, making her excuse to leave.

Ben reached out, with a hand on her arm. "Abigail..." He said slowly. She turned to look at him, and gave him a reassuring smile.

"I'm Ok, just tired." She said.

He nodded. "Ok, I'll join you in a second."

She nodded alongside him, and left the room. Michael also made an excuse of going to check on Ryan, and left Riley and Ben alone. Ben sat down in the nearest chair and looked up at Riley.

"You've really pulled a number this time." He said bitterly.

"Ben, I thought you would understand this more than anyone."

"Can you please explain to me what you insist I'm not getting?"

"This is dangerous. Not only for the people who go after it, but for the whole world. Does the whole 'final apocolypse' idea mean nothing to you?"

"I can understand that." Ben nodded. "I just have to know why it has to be us, and why now. Anyone can go, we'll pass it on to Courtney and Dean..."

"I've tried." Riley said. "They're tracking something in Asia and won't be back for months."

"Sarah?"

"Going through a divorce case and is fighting her ex for custody of Lucy."

"What about Serena and Darren, they wanted a case in Africa?" Even though they were barely older than students.

"They've just been given one in Kenya."

Ben sighed into his hands again. "We can't go." He decided.

"Why not?" Riley asked. "You're the only one who can stay two steps ahead of Ian. He can't get to this first."

"That doesn't matter-"

"Of course it matters!"

"With the information he has now, Ian's probably twelve steps ahead. He's probably already in Egypt." Ben pointed out. Ian had the few days head start that would be essential.

"Then we have to hurry." Riley suggested.

"I'm sorry, Riley, as much as I'd like to save the world, I can't put Abi and the baby in that kind of danger." Ben said simply.

"You think there will be a world for them if Ian gets there first?" Riley asked.

This hit home, and Ben was silent for a long time. He hated that it was being thrown in his face how he might not be able to protect Abigail and their child if what Riley was saying is true.

"I'll think about it." He replied wearily, and started to leave the room.

Riley was left dumbfounded in the centre of his office. Then at the last minute, he called out to Ben.

"Wait a sec, Abi's pregnant?"


	14. Giving In

Dinner that evening was mainly quiet. Riley was moping silently, something that he always did when he wanted Ben to give in to something. It didn't always work, granted, but hopefully it would this time. Michael just sat silently, glancing between Ben and Riley, sensing the tension between the two men, and then at Abigail and Ryan, who were sitting oblivious to this tension.

Abigail stood up when they had finished and started to take Ryan's plate. "Okay, sweetie, let's have your plate." She said, and he handed it to her.

"Can I help?" Ryan asked her. Abigail smiled at him.

"Sure. You want to get Michael and Uncle Riley's plates?" She said, and he nodded, getting down from his chair. Abigail took Ben's plate, and he kissed her as she straightened up again.

"Lovely dinner, hon." He told her.

She smiled at him. "Thank you. We're stuck for a dessert though, there's basically just whatever's in the kitchen." She shrugged.

Riley looked up from handing Ryan his plate. "There should be some cheesecake in the freezer. I brought some while you were away, but wasn't enough of a pig to eat it myself."

"Who wants some?" Abigail asked.

"Me!" Ryan said excitedly.

"Okay...you be careful with those plates." Abigail told him, and he followed her into the kitchen.

Once they were out of earshot, Riley rounded on Ben. "Have you spoken about it?" He asked him impatiently.

"No."

"Ben!" Riley protested unfairly.

"I'm sorry, Riley." He said, glancing in the direction where Abigail had just walked out of the room, his eyes falling upon one of the photos from their wedding day. "I can't do it." He decided firmly.

"She can." Riley said, and they all knew that the only 'she' he could be referring to was Abigail.

Ben sighed. "You really think that Abigail has something to do with this?" He asked, even though he didn't want to go into this conversation again. He leaned forward in his chair, placing his head in his hands.

Riley nodded, also leaning forward, but, unlike Ben, choosing not to drown in his palms. "It's too strong a coincidence, don't you think? Her first words, her reaction to the map of Egypt...she knows about this necklace, Ben."

Ben looked up tiredly. "Really? Because she seemed to know nothing about it." He pointed out.

"Well, maybe she just doesn't know that she knows." He shrugged.

"That doesn't make any sense." Michael pointed out, but both men ignored this comment.

"Your family had the legacy, Ben. Maybe she has her own."

"No one has a clue about it." Ben counteracted.

"She felt something when she touched it." Riley reminded him.

"It's too risky." He shook his head.

"What's too risky?" Abigail asked as she came back into the room.

"Noth-" Ben started, but Riley cut him off.

"Going after the necklace." Ben shot him a glance, and Ryan climbed back up into his chair with his cheesecake.

"What necklace?" The boy asked.

"There is no necklace, little man." Ben told him, putting on a smile for him.

"But Riley said there was." Ryan said with a confused frown.

"It's just a story." Ben nodded, and Ryan did as well, going back to his cheesecake.

They ate dessert in silence and afterwards, it was Abigail who broke the quiet.

"Ryan, why don't you go beat Michael on the PlayStation?" She suggested lightly.

Michael rolled his eyes. "I can beat him, you know." He told her.

Abigail nodded her head in the direction of the living room. "Then go prove it."

Michael took Ryan and left the room, leaving Ben, Abigail and Riley in another fit of silence.

"Abigail..." Ben started, but she shook her head.

"Ben, maybe we should go." She suggested quietly.

"What?" He asked her, unsure she had just said it.

She shrugged. "Maybe I do know something."

"Abi, the chances of that are too low-" He started, but she cut him off.

"We've overcome more than low chances before, Ben." She told him, and he knew that she was talking about the pregnancy.

He sighed, looking at her sadly and shaking his head. "That's why I don't want to risk it...risk you..." He tlold her.

"What's the worst that can happen?" She asked.

The worst? Ben didn't want to think about the worst. He didn't even want to think about the remotely bad things.

"Famous last words." Riley muttered.

Ben turned to him. "You were all for this a minute ago."

"I still am." He nodded.

Ben sighed again. "Can we just think about this logically for a minute? You want to go into Egypt..."

"Yeah."

"With no map?"

"Yeah."

"Just a sheet of paper?"

"Yeah."

"No idea where you're going?"

"Yeah."

"To go after something just on the suspicion that Ian might have gone after it?"

"Ian would have gone after it." Riley nodded.

"We don't know that for sure." Ben denied.

"This has Ian's style all over it, Ben." Riley said, laying his hands out in gesture. "I think it's pretty obvious that he's out of prison for revenge."

"Exactly. This might be a set up, to get us to go somewhere where we're not protected..." Ben reasoned.

"And what if it's not?" Riley asked. "What if its all true?"

Ben was silent for a while, thinking it over. He was never one to turn down an adventure, especially not on this scale, but there was Abigail to think about now. He loved her, and they had a baby on the way. He couldn't do anything to risk them. "We might already too be late." He reasoned after a while.

Riley shook his head ever so slightly. "I think we'd know if we were too late."

"Riley-"

"Ben." Abigail stepped in again. They looked at each other. "We need to go." She said quietly.

He shook his head. "Abi, no, I'm not-"

"I need to know the answers." She said, sounding desperate, unshed tears forming in her eyes. He stepped closer to her.

"What answers?"

"I need to know why I know things without ever learning them."

Ben looked at Abigail, whose eyes pleaded with him, and then looked at Riley. Slowly, he nodded.

"Okay, we'll go."


	15. Thin Walls

Leaning his head back against the chair, letting it sink into the pillow of the seat, Ben groaned quietly. "How did you talk me into this, Riley?" He asked Riley, who sat on behind him

Riley shook his head, leaning forward in his seat to where Ben could see him. "I didn't. Not me." He said defensively, before jabbing his finger towards where Abigail sat, beside Ben, with Ryan on her other side, looking out of the window excitedly. "Abi did...and she probably didn't use talking."

"I heard that, Riley." Abigail told him warningly, not looking up from the book she was reading.

Riley gulped looking panicked. "You're going to kill me in my sleep, aren't you?"

"Just sleep with one eye open." She said simply.

Ben turned in his seat as they had still not taken off, and looked at Riley. "Any word from Ian?" He asked, still almost dreading the answer.

"Nothing." Riley confirmed leaning back into his seat beside a tired Michael, who hadn't been thrilled about getting out of bed at three in the morning to make the first available flight to Cairo. "Chances are he was in Egypt days ago, remember?"

"But he's a wanted criminal." Michael protested, making sure to keep his voice down, seeing as the first available flight hadn't had five available seats in first class, much to Riley's annoyance, and they didn't exactly need the rest of the travellers keying in on their conversation. "How is it even possible for him to leave the country in the first place? The security in these places is tighter than Marcus's wallet."

Abigail let out a sign of indignation at Marcus's name, but no one scolded her about it, she had every reason to dislike him at the moment, even if he was her brother.

"Ian...has his ways." Ben explained to Michael, regardless of Abigail's protest.

"Lots of them." Riley added.

Michael simply grinned triedly. "Oh well, let the fun begin."

Ben settled back into his seat, and Michael went back to his beloved sleep. Ben found, however, that Abigail had closed her book, her finger still marking the page, and was staring at the back of the seat in front of her as if it were something completely different.

"You okay?" He asked her, putting his hand over hers.

"I think we left the milk on the table." She told him, furrowing her eyebrows together.

Ben laughed, and shook his head. "I put it in the fridge, where it always is. We never leave the milk out."

Abigail ndoded. "Is the door locked?"

"Always."

"What about the garage?" She checked.

"Completely barricaded." Ben confirmed, somewhat laughing at Riley's insistance on protection for his Ferrari rather than the house. The man practically lived with his car, had it been legal, he might have married it.

"And what about-"

"Abi, don't worry." Ben assured her. "We checked everything six times before we left."

She smiled, snapping out of her trance. "Oh yeah." She said, opening her book again. "Yeah, we did."

Ben shook his head, laughing silently. "Besides, you're the one who wanted to go on this trip."

-------------------------------

Arriving in Egypt was like a breath of fresh air for Abigail. Her passion for the country was the same as that of America, perhaps more so for its ancient mysteries.

"God, I love this country." She said as they left the airport. In one hand she held onto her carry on bag, and the other was tightly gripping Ryan's, who carried his rucksack on his back. The rest of the men were carrying the suitcases.

Then one thought struck her.

"Where are we staying?"

Ben looked at Riley. "Riley made arrangements."

"I did?"

Abigail turned around. "Riley." She said, almost warning him to tell her something other than a hotel name and a room number.

Instead, he stalled and stammered. "I...uh..."

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me!" She moaned. This was not the news she wanted to be told after a very long flight.

"Don't worry, I got it." Michael reassured them. "Ian's not the only one with connections." He added with a wink.

Surprisingly, this didn't settle Abigail's disbelief at all. If anything, it only worried her more. "Michael, if I have to stay in some dive with any of your friends, I swear to God, I'll - Emma?"

Her cousin approaching her wasn't something that she had expected, although it did to something to improve her confidence in Michael's decision making.

"Hey, guys." Emma said brightly. Abigail had always thought her as rather tanned, living under this heat all year round, but compared to its natural inhabitants, she seemed pale.

"See, accomodation sorted." Michael said smugly, giving his cousin a kiss on the cheek for greeting.

"Mike said you were tracking something in Egypt and needed a place to stay." Emma told them. "It's no palace, but it's open to you all."

"Thanks." Ben smiled, knowing that it would be good for Ryan to have Evy for company.

"No problem." Emma waved off, as if it were nothing for five people to launch themselves upon her home. "Come on, Johnny's waiting in the car."

"We're all fitting in one car?" Riley asked as they picked up their bags and headed in the direction Emma had started in.

"It's a big car." Emma assured him.

"If not, we'll tie a rug to the back, and Riley can sit on that." Ben joked, causing Ryan to laugh.

Riley trudged along behind them, muttering under his breath sarcastically. "Ha ha, let all make fun of Riley."

-----------------------------------

"Emma, this place is beautiful." Abigail complimented as the two women stood in the kitchen together. 'Stood' was probably the wrong term for Abigail, who had been forced by her cousin to sit on a stool at the breakfast bar to get her off her feet.

Emma smiled. "I miss being in America," She admitted, notioning to all the pictures on the wall beside Abigail that were almost all taken in America. "But coming out here was the best decision I ever made. I've got Johnny, and I've got Evy. I couldn't want more."

Abigail smirked. "Maybe Oded Fehr in a steaming hot tub?" She suggested, remembering Emma's fondness for the actor of her favourite film from their teenage years.

"One wouldn't complain." She sighed dreamily as she took a plate and started to dry it up.

"We heard that!" Came the protesting calls of Ben and Emma's husband, Johnny, who were in the other room with Riley and Michael, no doubt getting the 'man's tour' of the house.

"Good." Emma called back firmly, and then muttered to herself. "Honestly, men, they're as bad as children."

Abigail looked around them. "Speaking of the devil, where is Evy?"

"She's at a friend's birthday party." Emma told her. "She'll be back in a few hours." She added, eyeing the clock.

"Sociable girl." Abigail smiled, drinking out of her glass of water. "Takes after her mother."

"Are you kidding?" Emma laughed. "We had to drag her kicking and screaming into the car. She didn't want to go." Abigail laughed at the image. "I don't know where she learns her insults from, but they're good."

"Yes...I wonder." Abigail said innocently, staring intently at Emma as she did so.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Come on, Emmz." Abigail laughed. "You can insult for the flag."

"I resent that." She said stubbornly, before noticing Abigail's empty glass. "Want some more water? I know the heat's probably different out here."

Different was probably the understatement of the year, and Abigail was quick to take the offer. "Please." She nodded.

"At least one of us can drink." Emma smirked as she took the glass from the counter.

"I'm here for work, not pleasure." Abigail defended with a sure smile.

Emma turned to her, placing the glass on the side and putting her hands on her hips. "When you're taking your husband on a business trip, its clear that you're mixing the two." She pointed out, and then went back to fixing the drink. "Just remember that we have thin walls, and my baby girl is sleeping down the hall. I don't want her mind tainted by Auntie Abi."

"Emma!" Abigail protested.

Emma shrugged. "Just saying..." She said innocently.

"I'll tell Johnny the same thing then." Abigail warned.

"That's not fair."

"That's completely fair."

Ben came into the kitchen, poking his head around the door. "Thanks, girls, we can hear what you're saying."

He disappeared again, and Emma laughed. "Told you we had thin walls.


End file.
